Midori Uchida’s hand-formed ceramics mesmerise us by their gentle forms, polished smooth surfaces, and delicate colours. These features make them look like pebbles on a beach that are naturally polished by tides and waves. Her signature raku ware series, achieved through experiments in different techniques, also features unique and mysterious patterns on its surface. These deep colours and abstract landscapes are produced from a specific method: the artist mixes some ground metal into her clay, fires at as low temperature as 1000 degrees centigrade, covers the fired ceramics with rice hull, then puts them in cold water to chill. In her RAKU series is found a crystalisation of collaboration between human and nature: potter’s skills and chemical reactions.
