28th May
Today I went to a Kintsugi workshop. It was a very different experience. I wanted to try it out to see what it was like and what I can take from it to apply to my current project or my practice in general. Kintsugi is something I’ve always been interested in.
Part of my ideas for the utopia project last semester had a form of Kintsugi in it.
Kintsugi (golden joinery) is the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery with lacquer dusted or mixed with powdered gold, silver, or platinum, a method similar to the maki-e technique. As a philosophy, it treats breakage and repair as part of the history of an object, rather than something to disguise. Lacquerware is a longstanding tradition in Japan, at some point it may have been combined with maki-e as a replacement for other ceramic repair techniques.
One theory is that kintsugi may have originated when Japanese shogun Ashikaga Yoshimasa sent a damaged Chinese tea bowl back to China for repairs in the late 15th century.When it was returned, repaired with ugly metal staples, it may have prompted Japanese craftsmen to look for a more aesthetic means of repair. Collectors became so enamored with the new art that some were accused of deliberately smashing valuable pottery so it could be repaired with the gold seams of kintsugi.
Kintsugi became closely associated with ceramic vessels used for chanoyu (Japanese tea ceremony). As a philosophy, kintsugi can be seen to have similarities to the Japanese philosophy of wabi-sabi, an embracing of the flawed or imperfect. Japanese aesthetics values marks of wear by the use of an object. This can be seen as a rationale for keeping an object around even after it has broken and as a justification of kintsugi itself, highlighting the cracks and repairs as simply an event in the life of an object rather than allowing its service to end at the time of its damage or breakage. Kintsugi can relate to the Japanese philosophy of “no mind” (mushin), which encompasses the concepts of non-attachment, acceptance of change and fate as aspects of human life.
Lacquerware is a longstanding tradition in Japan and, at some point, kintsugi may have been combined with maki-e as a replacement for other ceramic repair techniques. While the process is associated with Japanese craftsmen, the technique was also applied to ceramic pieces of other origins including China, Vietnam, and Korea.
Types of kintsugi:
Crack (ひび), the use of gold dust and resin or lacquer to attach broken pieces with minimal overlap or fill-in from missing pieces.
Piece method (欠けの金継ぎ例), where a replacement ceramic fragment is not available and the entirety of the addition is gold or gold/lacquer compound.
Joint call (呼び継ぎ), where a similarly shaped but non-matching fragment is used to replace a missing piece from the original vessel creating a patchwork effect.
British artist Charlotte Bailey, who was inspired by kintsugi to create textile works involving the repair of broken vases; her practice involves covering the shards with fabric and stitching them back together using gold metallic thread.
American artist Karen LaMonte, creates monumental sculptures of women’s clothing worn by seemingly invisible human figures; when a kiln explosion broke a number of these works, LaMonte used kintsugi techniques to repair the ceramic sculptures with gold.
New York designer George Inaki Root, who worked with Japanese artisans to create a line for his jewelry company Milamore entitled “Kintsugi”; Root told Forbes that the designs were inspired by themes of beauty and brokenness, and his longstanding connection to kintsugi philosophies.
Los Angeles artist Victor Solomon, who was inspired by kintsugi practices and philosophies to create "Kintsugi Court", a fractured public basketball court in South Los Angeles he repaired with gold-dusted resin. The project was finished in 2020 to coincide with the restart of the NBA season, which had been paused due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the philosophy and practice of kintsugi emerged as a source of comfort. It has been used as a metaphor for rebuilding after tragic events such as dealing with loss, sickness, trauma, and the disruption of daily life. Kirsten Weir, writing in 2020 in the American Psychological Association's periodical Monitor on Psychology, says, “Post-traumatic growth is like kintsugi for the mind,” while The BMJ described kintsugi philosophy as a powerful tool for healing after the grief of losing loved ones to COVID-19.
Most people don’t purposefully shatter their cherished pieces of pottery, but that isn’t always the case in Japanese culture. Adorning broken ceramics with a lacquer mixed with powdered gold is part of a more than 500-year-old Japanese tradition that highlights imperfections rather than hiding them. This not only teaches calm when a cherished piece of pottery breaks; it is a reminder of the beauty of human fragility as well.
In a world that so often prizes youth, perfection and excess, embracing the old and battered may seem strange. But the 15th-Century practice of kintsugi, meaning “to join with gold”, is a reminder to stay optimistic when things fall apart and to celebrate the flaws and missteps of life.
The kintsugi technique is an extension of the Japanese philosophy of wabi-sabi, which sees beauty in the incomplete and value in simplicity. The broken pieces’ gilded restoration usually takes up to three months, as the fragments are carefully glued together with the sap of an indigenous Japanese tree, left to dry for a few weeks and then adorned with gold running along its cracks.
In an age of mass production and quick disposal, learning to accept and celebrate scars and flaws is a powerful lesson in humanity and sustainability.
The workshop was at the Edinburgh Remarkery. Which is an award-winning environmental social enterprise committed to diverting waste from landfill, building a stronger community, and promoting a culture of repair and reuse. We repair, refurbish and recycle what others send to landfill, and we teach others valuable sustainable skills through training and job opportunities, and through our creative workshops.
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