Bizen ware, shaped by fire

In the hills of Bizen, Okayama Prefecture, Hitoshi Morimoto works within a ceramic tradition formed over a thousand years. He was raised in a family of potters, and his practice is rooted in a close relationship to place, where material, landscape and daily life exist in a quiet, unbroken rhythm. Time spent studying sculpture in Tokyo broadened this perspective, bringing a sensitivity to form that continues to inform his approach. Using the region’s iron-rich clay, fired without glaze, he embraces a process guided as much by natural forces as by intention: flame, ash and time leaving their trace on every surface. Rather than seeking control, Morimoto-san engages with the material with a quiet attentiveness, allowing its character to reveal itself. Alongside traditional Bizen ware, he has developed ‘Shirahana’, exploring the clay’s lighter tones through a more restrained firing method. Across both, his work carries a sculptural awareness of form, function, space and light – a living tradition, gently shaped for the present.