My name is Daniela Hard and I'm a Collector. I introduce you to world-renowned experts who teach us how to improve our eye and how to identify the right piece because everyone can become a Collector. Oh Daniela, welcome to my gallery. I'm well and it's wonderful to have you back. This is so exciting. And exciting to your gallery is like traveling to Japan. Oh thank you. That's what we've tried to do in this wonderful space. So this show focuses on one region, Mino. How does this stand in the history of Japanese culture? Ah, Mino. Mino is one of the most important regions of Japan both culturally and art historically as well as historically. And hence it became a region renowned for certain aesthetics as well. Contemporary Japanese ceramics stand at a top for artistic imagination. Traditionally seen as the ultimate expression of Japanese art, spirit and life. Over the past two decades a new generation of ceramics have redefined and reshaped clay art, taking ceramics to new horizons. It has become a specialized area of collecting which attracts passionate and dedicated collectors fascinated with ambitious achievements in the clay medium. The exhibition Fathers and Sons at the Joan B. Mervis L. T. D. presents the work of four artists from two families as its title suggests. It showcases the work of the first generation clay artists and examines the way in which the second generation has gained independence while honoring the ceramic tradition of Mino, the city of their birthplace. I found this show to be a great occasion to visit the gallery to learn how to identify excellence in contemporary Japanese clay art and discover what makes its groundbreaking original and collectible. John the two Fathers represented in this show, they are both legendary clay artists and both of them have national and regional honors. How does one become eligible for such an honor? The Japanese tradition for what we call Ningin Kokuhou or living national treasures was a system established in 1950 to honor, at that point in time, the men who were considered the apogee of their particular profession. Once an artist is so designated and at this moment they are only nine artists, living artists who are living national treasures, there are many deceased living national treasures as artists that sounds. Wow, I'm surprised. And the values for these men's work tends to escalate from, I would say, between 30 to nearly double what their works were fetching prior to that official accommodation. From that moment? From about that moment in time. Okay, so these are their Fathers. Now let's talk about the sons. Those two sons, how did they depart from the tradition of their Fathers, but also from the tradition of Mino? In Japan there's a almost millennial tradition for sons to study at the knee of their father and their grandfather and to replicate that aesthetic and that tradition and that technique. These two young men have chosen to stay within tradition but to part and the fact that they have the support of their Fathers to do something different and even by Japanese definition radically different speaks to a very special relationship from father to son. So here we see the two families, father and son, father and son. This plate with its bifurcated design pattern with the early spring pattern of plum on one side and the autumn grasses on the far side separated by the moon being reflected over these cascading ways is a classic representation from the Rimpas School. Besides being related by blood, they are related aesthetically by color tone. Waukau K. the son has chosen to adopt the very difficult glazed type called Crackler Céleodon. And what about the value? Well age is everything in Japan and someone who is 85 years old and has won many awards, the price structure in Japan will always be much more elevated than someone who is in their 50s. So the Suzuki family who lives just five minute car ride away from the Waukau family because Suzuki Osamu, the artist of this water jar, is a living national treasure and in Gengeng Kokuhou. Suzuki Osamu when he was made a... Grashelch. Please, the cover is really strong. Yeah. It's very striking and you notice that the handle is divided in two. It's so sculptural and it's almost heretical to make a handle where it's actually in two sections like two mountains and then you look at how the cover matches with base and the piece is sculptural. How the light cascades. Suzuki Tetsu, like Waukau, if you compare these two pieces, there's a certain amount of geometry that's consistent between the two. The idea of faceted surface is consistent between the two but the approach is completely different. Suzuki Osamu, his works, can be even more expensive than Waukau because of the difference in their designations within the government. It's this piece sold for the neighborhood of $60,000, whereas the piece down below is under $5,000. What is the future? Can you say something about that? It's my favorite topic. Thank you. The future is ground and it's wonderful. When I started dealing in this field, which was in 1984, there were six museums in the United States making an effort to collect in this field. Now I have over 60 museums in the United States not only collecting in the field but making permanent case work and permanent installations within their museums, which most conspicuously here in New York is the Metropolitan Museum. The interest on the part of collectors that are inspired by these museums, we have exhibitions that have traveled around the United States focused on contemporary clay. Joan, thank you very much for teaching me so much and it's always great being here. It's wonderful having you here and I always learn by teaching you because you absorb this material so quickly and the passion and the love that you express when you look at this work is exactly my raison d'être. So please come visit us again and enjoy another cup of tea. I will. I will. This episode was sponsored by Rago and White, specializing in the sale of modern and contemporary art, design, ceramics and glass ad auction.