Matsumoto Sachiko: Bringing Japanese Crafts to the World by Elle Murrell “The only thing I took to Canada from Japan was pottery. I still remember holding that cup in both hands and experiencing a profound sense of comfort,” she recalls. “My roommate pointed out that I looked quintessentially Japanese, cradling the cup as I drank…

by Mora Chartrand A shared homemade meal is a fine way to offer gratitude for friends and family and participating in the actual act of cooking the meal together makes it even more special. Shabu shabu (swish-swish) is the Japanese onomatopoeic equivalent for the name of a popular nabemono, a simple and delectable Japanese hot…

Sake: This Year’s Rice Report by Sake Expert John Gauntner Sake Rice Survived a Couple of Typhoons, But How Did it Fare Otherwise? In late October, the National Research Institute of Brewing in Japan released their annual rice report, loosely translated as the Suitability of This Year’s Rice to Sake Brewing Report. In short, the…

A Man of Intelligence by Ian Pfennigwerth A review by David Morton A Man Of Intelligence is an excellent book about the life of Captain Eric Nave, an Australian Codebreaker and the basic founder of Australian cypher breaking against the Japanese during World War II. Eric Nave is no James Bond type, but in his…

Commentary by Charles Bernstein, A.I.A. Japanese architect Kengo Kuma won the international design competition in 2010 for a new design museum in Dundee Scotland. Eight years later its doors are about to open. It will undoubtedly become a symbol of the city’s attempted renaissance. The soon to be opened museum was conceived as a catalyst…

by Elizabeth Andoh ODEN おでん Japan’s iconic ODEN is a slow-simmered, hodgepodge: fish sausages, daikon radishes, octopus, potatoes, boiled eggs, konnyaku (a broth-absorbing, speckled aspic processed from a tuber vegetable), and all sorts of tōfu. On the first chilly nights of autumn, oden is welcomed back to the family dinner table, pub-like izakaya menus and…

Kusama and the Compulsive Visionaries by Gail Rieke Perhaps this sounds like the name of a band, but it is not. Yayoi Kusama may currently be the most appreciated international woman artist of this time. Some of you may have seen her polka dot pumpkin in Naoshima, or her mirrored installations, or the Forever Museum…

Contemporary glass artist Miya Kitamura Valuing beauty in the everyday object By Dasha Klyachko Miya Kitamura was born into a family of traditional ceramic artists in Kyoto and was making ceramics from an early age. Though she studied ceramics in high school and college, and was expected to take over the family business, Kitamura felt…

By Marc Peter Keane In Japan there is a highly sculptural and enigmatic form of garden known as karesansui that evokes a scene of the natural world — a landscape or seascape — through the restrained use of boulders, some plants, and at times raked gravel. The word karesansui is written with the three characters…

Interview by Brian Covert LARRY KORN was a 26-year-old farmhand from the United States living and working at a communal farm in rural Kyoto in 1974 when he decided to go and see for himself an enigmatic farmer-philosopher he had been hearing about through the grapevine in Japan. The buzz among farmworkers was that this…