Читать книгу Japanese & Oriental Ceramic - Hazel H. Gorham - Страница 11

PUBLISHER'S FOREWORD

Japan has been called the cultural melting pot of the Orient. This is especially true in reference to ceramics. Greek ceramic art has died out; that of Persia belongs to history; China, where the ceramic art reached glorious perfection, has fallen on evil days and has little to teach us now. Only in Japan are there strong traces of that cultural stream still pursuing eastward outlets.

In the development of the ceramic art, Japan of course owes much to its close cultural contacts with China and Korea. China, in the T'ang and Sung dynasties, reached a pinnacle in art which has never been surpassed and seldom equaled elsewhere in the world.

The Japanese were eager pupils of China's master artists, and from the 16th century onward Japanese pottery developed rapidly. At the beginning of the 17th century the discovery of important deposits of porcelain stone in the Arita district of Hizen Province put the porcelain industry on a firm basis—and Japanese ceramics were in full flower. This book was originally published under the title Japanese and Oriental Pottery.