Akira Yamada

People have woven a variety of stories related to "red" throughout history. This may have to do with the fact that red is the color of blood. The color red has also held a unique position in ceramics.
In recent years, Akira Yamada has been working on a series of shojohi (burning red) works, in which he employs the color red. Shojohi refers to a red ( "hi" ) named after "shojo," a legendary Chinese creature. A shojo is said to have a face like a human being, a voice like a child, bright red body hair, a physique like a dog or a monkey, and very red blood. The red in Akira Yamada' s works is brimming with a charm that has hardly ever been found not just in
ceramics but in the entire past. It is not a shiny red that reflects light but a deep color tone that leads our eyes on the outside profoundly and quietly into the inside. In order to produce this red, Yamada applies black and pale red underglazes to the unglazed ceramic and fires at high temperatures, then he repeatedly applies goldish overglazes three or four times. This time, he has added silver, which has resulted in a very profound tone of red.