259. ŌIWA Tomoyuki. 1977- . black Bizen-ware drinking cup

 259. ŌIWA Tomoyuki 大岩智之. 1977- . Kuro guinomi 黒ぐい呑   (black [Bizen-ware] drinking cup)

Ōiwa Tomoyuki was born in Kobe, Hyogo prefecture, in 1977, and graduated from the Bizen Ceramic Center in 2004. The following year he became a student of the outsider Kakurezaki Ryūichi 隠崎隆一, with whom he would remain for eight years before going independent. In 2014 he built a half-submerged tunnel kiln (anagama), completing his first firing in 2015. He has since been featured widely and is known for his sake vessels. 

Glazed in dun brown and black. Weight: 158 g (5.6 oz). Height: 5.4 cm (2-1/8 in). Widths: mouth, 5.4 cm (2-1/8 in), widest, 6 cm (2-5/8 in); base, 5 cm (2 in). 

Any given horizontal cross-section of  this is roughly circular. The cup sits on a flat irregular foot ring. Before trimming, the base was probably completely flat. The inside of the base has been gouged out in a rough yin-ying pattern. The foot ring is level, and the cup rests stably on it. This came with a small white sticker with the number 11 on it attached to the base. Above the base the walls rise outward at about a 45-degree angle, to the widest point of the piece, about a centimeter (3/8 in) above the base. From the widest point to the mouth, the walls gradually sloped inward. There are wide, shallow horizontal grooves encircling the cup in this section. The mouth is generally even but has two small dips in it. There are tiny remnants of the three posts used to hold the piece away from the kiln shelves on the black side of the piece. The interior generally mirrors the exterior. The surface of the piece is smooth throughout and has the slight stickiness of a glazed work. 

The bottom, most of the interior, and half of the wall area were glazed in black. The other half of the walls and the lips of the mouth were glazed in a dun brown, which was allowed to drip into the black area of the walls along the horizontal grooves. Where the brown glaze thins out over the black glaze, it turned a light blue color. 

This came in a wooden box, inscribed by the artist in three lines: 黒 /ぐい呑 / sigil (black / small drinking cup //sigil), followed by the artist’s seal stampeed in red. Ōiwa’s sigil is indecipherable but appears to be the characters in his surname. Included in the box were a gray wrapping cloth and a small printed card with the artist’s potted biography. 

Purchased from the Kura Monzen Gallery in Kyoto in September 2024, who purchased it directly from the potter in June 2023 (invoice and shipping documents).