When I visited the Hi Matsuri festival, I was surprised by the wide range of colors, shapes, and designs of the exhibitors’ pottery on display. This rich variety of types makes it tantalizingly difficult to choose what to buy and is exciting even for someone like me, a complete amateur who certainly cannot list pottery as a hobby. As I enjoyed looking around, I began to wonder what Kasama-ware actually was after all, so I visited some potters in search of an answer.
     Tofusha (East Wind Gallery) is a pottery maker operated by a family of four—husband, wife, son, and daughter. I had a chat with the wife, Yoko Sudo. Tofusha’s history began in 1973, when her husband, Shigeo Sudo, moved to a district to which the city of Kasama was inviting potters to settle in a bid to promote industry and built a kiln there. He subsequently married Yoko in 1982, and they opened Tofusha. Now called the To no Komichi (Pottery Road), that district has become a well-known spot in Kasama where many potters operate kilns. Raised in such an environment, the Sudo’s children themselves are now engaged in making pottery and pursuing their own ideal works as potters.
     When I asked her why they had chosen Kasama, Yoko replied that while the positive efforts of the prefecture and city to entice potters to settle here had played a part, another important factor was the liberal atmosphere of Kasama compared with other pottery-producing regions, which made it easy to move in from outside and engage in pottery making. There are no binding rules that Kasama-ware must be like this or like that, she said. In addition, for someone like Yoko who studied art in Tokyo, the proximity to Japan’s capital was an attraction too.
     Visiting Tofusha, I was struck by the fact that the works of the four family members were distinctively individualistic. They all had completely different aims. For example, Yoko, who studied art in the golden age of modern art, is attracted by figurative works, so she is good at making objets d’art and ceramic pictures. Although their goals are different, however, Yoko said that the good point about making pottery as a family is that the parents can advise the children on such things as the properties of glaze and clay.
     When I asked about future goals, Yoko replied that although expanding overseas is rather difficult, when Covid-19 subsides, they want to make Kasama-ware known among foreign tourists as well. They are using Creema for e-commerce. Apparently most online customers in Japan are women aged from 30 to around 50; sales to China and Taiwan are also possible.