In early spring, an elderly lady came to my shop. She said that she lives on her own. Looking at one item, she said apologetically ‘Living on my pension, I do not have much money. When the right moment comes, please let me have it. I promise I will come again’. It was her second visit. Indeed, she was looking at the same item in excitement on her first visit. ‘Whenever you like,’ I said.
The lady who visited my shop twice, however, hasn’t appeared since. Sometimes, I think of her. But at the same time, I also think whether it was enough that the item gave her happiness.

She might have sought something to fulfil her solitude. However, if a fragment of the item’s beauty had sunk in her heart somehow, surely the item would be happy too.Due to the impact of the coronavirus pandemic, we have had more time being isolated. It might feel different if you live with your family. But if you live on your own, it is not only about loneliness but also, although you have a lot of time, that your time goes quickly yet is spent aimlessly on just living everyday life.

You are not quite able to live sophisticatedly like the novelist Kafu Nagai, nor determinedly write ‘Journal of a Solitude’ like the American novelist May Sarton. Day after day, you clean, wash, eat and try to find and walk a new route. I took a long walk in the empty Kanazawa city without encountering a single person. Passing streets that I have never tried before, I thought of both the trouble and importance of human existence. It made me reflect on myself as a member of this society.

During the period where we were told ‘stay home’ like dogs are told ‘sit’, the only thing I came across in the empty town was a bark of a dog whose figure remained unseen. Wandering like a strange person, I was impressed by the liveliness of a pet faithful to a human, even though it didn’t show its figure.Regardless of whether it is faithful or not, here is a dog-shaped water-dropper for writing with ink. After the decline of the dazzling and universal pottery made in Mino during the Momoyama period, Ofuke ware pottery emerged at the beginning of the Edo period. Generally, the name Ofuke ware suggests house potteries made in a kiln built in the Shitaofuke garden within Nagoya Castle. But Ofuke ware was also made in Mino, and today, potteries using ash glaze are called Mino Ofuke ware.

A pottery dog, whose body is patterned in spots by iron glaze, neatly sits and looks at us with a curly tail. It is little, yet a good size to place by your sitting spot. A dog with a spotty pattern is rare amongst Mino Ofuke ware water-droppers. The potter might have been a dog lover. This is one of the items loved by cultured people and surviving up until today. The previous master must have had it on their desk all the time. A letter of business or a love letter, we never know. But when the master was in solitude, the little thing must have fulfilled the empty space.
Do we need something to fulfil our solitude? When the spirit of the thing deeply resonates with our hearts, yes.
The elderly lady might be taking a walk somewhere on her own, just now, prior to her third visit to my shop.

Masahito Kurotani, Director, genra