Seven-tiered assembled box

This stacked box, consisting of six tiers and a lid, is designated by the artist as a kumikushige, or “assembled box.” Trained as a mechanical engineer, Yoshitaka Hasu turned his attention to ceramics in his mid-twenties, and in 1975 began an apprenticeship under Ban’ura Shiro (1941–2001), an acclaimed maker of Iga ware tea utensils. After finishing his training, Hasu established his own kiln in Iga, a center of ceramic production since the ninth century, in what is today northwestern Mie Prefecture. Hasu uses only clay from the Iga area, prized for its many particles of feldspar and quartz that result in a dramatic pocked surface enhanced by vitreous natural ash glazes. Here, Hasu used a variety of natural ash glazes, from translucent green to lustrous black, to embellish the tiers’ exteriors, while a metallic silver glaze commands the inside surfaces of some tiers. The lid features a mesmerizing pool of glassy black glaze.