Blue Emptiness,
Summer Stillness.
Three series, made for the hand.
Mariko Chiba's tea ware — teapots, kyusu, cups, gaiwan, strainers — comes in three series shaped around one summer thought: the cool of a breeze, the depth of open water, the stillness inside both. Some glazes carry iron, and iron never behaves. The blues are ash: for her Prussian Blue series Mariko makes the glaze herself, from the ash of local birch and beech — a practice that has become rare, in Europe especially. Either way, every piece keeps a little unpredictability the kiln decided.
Nothing sits behind glass — pick a piece up, turn it, feel the weight. On the opening Sunday the ceremony is poured into them; that is the exhibition working as intended.
Dyed with tea waste, indigo and iron.
Yurika Saito's cloths hang over the tatami and through the room — dyed with tea waste, indigo, and iron. The same iron that moves in the glazes moves in the fabric; clay and cloth end up speaking one language of depth and variation. The colours shift with the day's light.
Blue for sky, white for cloud — the room wears the season for a week.
Walk in — the makers are in.
The exhibition keeps the tea bar's hours: Wednesday to Sunday, 14:00–18:00, no ticket, no booking. Mariko and Yurika are in the room through the week — ask them anything, or ask nothing and just drink your tea among the work.
Pieces and cloth are for sale through the week; what you buy has usually just been in your hands.
