Katsushika Hokusai's Art

Great Wave off Kanagawa - Public Domain

In November 2023, I was visiting my daughter in Washington near Seattle. We found out about an art exhibit for Katsushika Hokusai’s art and visited one afternoon. The exhibit was one of the most amazing to me. Hokusai’s art is just incredible and his contribution to the art world is still impactful. 

For pronunciation: Consonants are like English, vowels like Spanish. So Hokusai is Ho - Coo - Sigh. Also, in Japanese, traditionally the surname comes first and the personal name second. Thus, Hokusai is his familiar or personal name while Katsushika is his family or surname. 

 

Self-portrait
Age 83
Wikimedia 
Commons

Katsushika Hokusai (1760-1849) was one of Japan’s great artists. He lived almost 90 years and changed his name 30 times. Most of his name changes reflected where he was at in his art production. We’ll look at a few of those.

 

Hokusai began drawing when he was only six years old. Some believe he got his start by helping his father, who polished metal mirrors for the shōgun. The mirrors included art work around the edges, usually flowers and vines.

 

When he was 18, Hokusai became an apprentice to artist, Shunshō, working at his school. His master called Hokusai, Shunrō, and this is the name Hokusai used when he published his first book of prints. After the master’s death, Hokusai had to leave the school when his thirst for knowledge of art led him to learn from a rival school.

 

Courtesan Sleeping
Public Domain
(Try enlarging the picture 
to see the incredible detail.)

Under Shunshō, Hokusai did mostly prints of courtesans and people of the court. When he left the school, his art focused more on landscapes and daily life. His depictions of the daily life of Japanese people were vivid and detailed. 

 

At 51, Hokusai became known as Taito and began a new type of art to him. He did more simplified drawings, creating Hokusai Manga. The art he produced at this time influences the manga of today. The style of artwork is very similar. He published 12 volumes of his manga during his life and three were published posthumously.

 

Red Fuji - Public Domain

The 1820’s to mid-1830’s were a time of renown for Hokusai’s art. His name during this period was Litsu and his fame in Japan grew. He created his most famous work, 36 Views of Mount Fuji. This collection contained “Great Wave off Kanagawa”, Hokusai’s most famous painting. The wave painting (pictured above) is reproduced often today in a variety of ways, including on the shower curtain in my guest bathroom. If you watch for that wave picture, you’ll start to notice where it’s used.

 

Hawfinch and Marvel-of-Peru 
Small Flowers Series 1834

Hokusai never stopped learning or growing as an artist. He believed he would not truly understand art until he reached 90, and it would be better if he could live until 130, when he would have divine understanding of art and would have “reached the stage where every dot and every stroke I paint will be alive.” 

 

From 36 View of Mount Fuji

During his 80s, Hokusai continued his art, mostly painting in his latter years. He had a table set up for him to produce art any time he wanted. His daughter lived with him and cared for him. She was also an artist. 

 

Wisteria and Wagtail
Small Flowers Series

On his deathbed, Hokusai reportedly said, “If only Heaven will give me just another ten years…five years, then I could become a real painter.”

 

I hope someday you have the chance to visit an exhibit of Hokusai’s art. The detail is exquisite. His pen and ink sketches have such a graceful style and his drawings of every day life are very detailed and lifelike. 

 

Have you ever heard of Hokusai? Have you seen some of his artwork? I’d love to hear from you. Be sure to enlarge the pictures in this post so you can see the detail he adds to his artwork.

The Night Attack - 1780s
From the real life story of the 47 Ronin.

Nancy J Farrier is an award-winning, best-selling author who lives in Southern Arizona in the Sonoran Desert. She loves the Southwest with its interesting historical past. When Nancy isn’t writing, she loves to read, do needlecraft, play with her cats and dog, and spend time with her family. You can read more about Nancy and her books on her website: nancyjfarrier.com.

What Happened to the Doolittle Raiders? One Last Plane! (Plus a GIVEAWAY!)

Cindy K. Stewart and I have been tag-teaming our posts on the exciting adventures of the Doolittle Raiders. And it’s been my favorite kind of tag team—the kind where she does the bulk of the work! 😊 As Cindy wraps up her series, she’s letting me cover the final plane: Plane #6, the Green Hornet. It’s one I have a special claim on, since three of its crew members appear in my upcoming debut novel, The Plum Blooms in Winter.

The crew of Doolittle Raid Plane #6, the Green Hornet.
L to R: Chase Nielsen, Dean Hallmark, Donald Fitzmaurice, Robert Meder, William Dieter
By US Air Force [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

By now you probably have the background. Just six months after the attack on Pearl Harbor, sixteen of the Army's medium-weight B-25 bombers left the deck of the carrier U.S.S. Hornet—a feat never attempted before or since. They deployed their payloads on Tokyo and other key targets on the Japanese main island. While the mission achieved its military objective, due to a communication breakdown the sortie left seventy-two of the eighty airmen stranded in enemy-occupied China.

Cindy has been filling you in on how the Chinese resistance smuggled most of the downed airmen out—at great risk and, ultimately, tremendous cost. One of the most dramatic stories belongs to the crew of the Green Hornet.

Crash Landing

I have a vintage copy of the book Four Came Home by Carroll V. Glines, in which Chase Nielsen, the Green Hornet’s navigator, tells their story in detail. With their fuel exhausted, the Green Hornet attempted a crash landing into the sea off China’s coast. They came down fast and hit the water hard. The enlisted men—Donald Fitzmaurice (gunner) and William Dieter (bombardier)—were both severely injured.

All five of the airmen managed to get free of the bomber and climb on top of the wreckage, but what was left of the B-25 was sinking rapidly. Tragically, the life raft proved inoperable. While the three least injured men tried to get it inflated, poor Dieter slipped into the waves. Co-pilot Robert Meder managed to grab Fitzmaurice just as a huge wave smashed the rest of them into the water.

The waves soon separated the men. They braved more than three hours in the water before reaching shore. Sadly, when Lieutenant Meder finally managed to drag himself and Fitzmaurice onto the beach, he discovered that Donald Fitzmaurice had succumbed to his wounds.

Nielsen stumbled into a trench in the dark and lost consciousness. He came to the next morning and crawled to a vantage point. He found himself overlooking a cove and a Chinese fishing village. He soon also found himself at the business end of what he described as “a real antiquated buffalo gun.” The young Chinese soldier aiming it at him ordered him to “Stand up or me shoot.”

The soldier directed Nielsen at gunpoint to walk up a path away from the beach. But he seemed wary, often glancing over his shoulder. After a few minutes, Nielsen heard a boat motor in the distance. “Run fast!” his captor commanded. “Japs come. Kill me, you!”

Once they reached thick cover, the soldier stopped and slung his rifle over his shoulder. “We fight Japanese. You no worry now. Go fast. follow me.” He brought Lieutenant Nielsen to a Chinese Nationalist army garrison. The Green Hornet’s other two survivors, Lieutenant Meder and the plane’s pilot Dean Hallmark, soon turned up there too.

The garrison commander, Captain Ling, promised to do his best to get them to Free China. But he emphasized the risks. If the Japanese caught them at it, Americans and Chinese would all be summarily shot.

Several Near Misses

When dawn broke, the Chinese smuggled the three airmen back to the cove and put them aboard "a sampan." They experienced their first near miss when the vessel was searched by a Japanese patrol. They sailed for two days upriver until they reached the sizable walled city of Wenzhou. Captain Ling announced he could take them no further, but would set them up with others they could trust.

At dark, they passed through a gate in the city’s ancient wall and were handed off to an older gentleman named Mr. Wong. They enjoyed a pleasant dinner with Sage Wong, an articulate former Buddhist monk who had studied in England. 

A boy rushed in to alert Mr. Wong that Japanese soldiers were searching the city. Mr. Wong hurried the three airmen down an alley in an effort to escape through the city gate, but Japanese were setting up a machine-gun station there. He tried leading them toward another gate, but peering around a corner they saw machine guns there too. 

Ancient gate of Linhai, a city in China's Zhejiang Province near Wenzhou.
By Marcus Hsu  talk [CC BY 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)], from Wikimedia Commons

What happened next was like a scene from a movie. Mr. Wong called a group of Chinese in flowing robes over and they surrounded the three big Americans. The airmen crouched and hid in the middle of the group and they all shuffled along together across the twelve-foot main road and into another building, right in front of a Japanese detachment.

Mr. Wong determined the Japanese were conducting a methodical search and the Americans had no choice but to hide where they were. There was very little to work with. Hallmark dove into a corner and Nielsen and Meder covered him with everything they could grab—grass mats, sacks, old blankets. They shoved a rickety bench in front of the pile, then climbed up into the open rafters and pushed into the darkest spots in the corners.

After some time, a Japanese soldier entered. His eyes rested for a moment on the pile where Dean was hiding, but he turned and left.

Betrayed

The men breathed a deep sigh of relief but remained hidden. A few more minutes passed. Another group of soldiers entered. The airmen were astonished to see the Chinese National garrison commander, Captain Ling, followed by a Japanese officer with a couple of his men. One of the soldiers lowered his rifle. The other strode up to the corner where Dean was hiding. He kicked the bench out of the way. 

The officer addressed Dean in clear English. “Where are the other two Americans?” When Dean wouldn’t answer, he pistol-whipped Mr. Wong until he fell to the floor moaning--directly beneath Nielsen’s hiding place in the rafters. As the officer stepped back, he lifted his head. He looked straight into Nielsen’s eyes.

The three survivors from the Green Hornet joined the five men who bailed from Plane #16, the Bat Out of Hell, ultimately enduring forty long months of Japanese prison "hospitality." Sadly, of those eight men, only four came home. I’ve summarized the rest of their story, and how God used that tragedy for His glory, here and here. And I hope you’ll consider reading my novel when it launches in December!

I'm hosting a drawing for a copy of Kristy Cambron's split-time historical novel, The Lost Castle, for new subscribers to my newsletter. You'll also receive updates on my novel, including an opportunity to gain complementary pre-launch access. To enter, please REGISTER HERE by Saturday, June 30. (I'm also giving away a second copy to a current subscriber, so those of you who registered in previous months will have another chance to win. :) )

I stepped away from a marketing career that spanned continents to write what I love: stories of reckless faith that showcase God's hand in history. I'm so excited to work with the all-star team at Mountain Brook Ink to launch my debut novel, The Plum Blooms in Winter, this December! Inspired by a remarkable true story from World War II's pivotal Doolittle Raid, The Plum Blooms in Winter is an American Christian Fiction Writers' Genesis Contest winner. The novel follows a captured American pilot and a bereaved Japanese prostitute who targets him for ritual revenge. Please also feel free to check out my blog, Five Stones and a Sling, which hovers in the region where history meets Bible prophecy meets current events. It's rich ground--we live in a day when prophecies are leaping from the Bible's pages into the headlines!

I live outside Phoenix with my husband, a third-generation airline pilot who doubles as my Chief Military Research Officer. We share our home with two mostly-grown-up kids and a small platoon of housecats.

The "Lost Crews" of the Doolittle Raid: After Infamy, Forgiveness Wins (With GIVEAWAY!)

Tomorrow marks the Doolittle Raid's seventy-sixth anniversary. Cindy K. Stewart is doing a marvelous job of filling you in on the exciting adventures of the Doolittle Raiders. But I have a special claim on Plane Sixteen, since it inspired my upcoming debut novel, The Plum Blooms in Winter. In honor of the occasion, Cara Grandle was kind enough to swap slots with me so I could tell you its story. (Thank you, Cara!)

Here's the background in a nutshell. Just six months after the attack on Pearl Harbor, eighty volunteers took flight on a bold and unprecedented mission. Sixteen medium-weight B-25 bombers left the deck of the carrier U.S.S. Hornet—a feat never attempted before or since. They deployed their payloads on Tokyo and other key targets on the Japanese main island. 

The bombers were too big to land on the carrier, so the plan called for them to fly on to China. But while the mission achieved its military objective, due to unforeseen circumstances the sortie left most of the airmen stranded in enemy-occupied China. 

Captured

Detail from a wartime poster featuring a photo of
Lieutenant Robert Hite, copilot of the Bat Out of Hell. Tokyo, April 1942.

Eight men—the crew of Plane #16, the Bat Out of Hell, and the three survivors of the crash of Plane #6, the Green Hornet—were captured by the Japanese. Anyone who saw the movie or read the book Unbroken will have a general picture of what these men endured. But where Louis Zamperini was a prisoner for a little more than two years, Doolittle’s “lost crews” remained in Japanese prison camps

… for forty long months, 34 of them in solitary confinement. We were imprisoned and beaten, half-starved, terribly tortured, and denied by solitary confinement even the comfort of association with one another. Three of my buddies were executed by a firing squad about six months after our capture and fourteen months later, another one of them died of slow starvation.… The bitterness of my heart against my captors seemed more than I could bear. 

- Corporal Jacob DeShazer in his tract I Was a Prisoner of Japan 

Of the eight Raiders captured, only four survived that ordeal. George Barr, Jacob DeShazer, Robert Hite and Chase Nielson returned to the U.S. different men. Here’s how they expressed it in a joint statement:

We were not what you would call religious men before we were captured. We went to Sunday school and church when we were kids… We memorized Bible verses and listened to sermons and said grace at meals…. But we never really understood the meaning behind those words and the source of strength they represented in our lives.…

We were given the Bible to read. We found in its ripped and faded pages a source of courage and faith we never realized existed. The verses we memorized as children suddenly came alive and became as vital to us as food.

We put our trust in the God we had not really accepted before and discovered that faith in His Word could carry us through the greatest peril of our lives. 

—Four Came Home (Carroll V. Glines, 1995) 

The crew of the Bat Out of Hell, captive.
Back row, l-r: William Farrow, George Barr, Robert Hite.
Front row, l-r: Jacob DeShazer, Harold Spatz.
Lieutenant Farrow and Sergeant Spatz were executed.

Forgiveness Wins: The Raider Returns

Corporal DeShazer, the former bombardier of the Bat Out of Hell, was transformed by what he read in the Bible. The Lord revealed to him during those miserable hours alone in his cell that He wanted to give the Japanese people an illustration of the meaning of forgiveness. Jake was to become that walking object lesson.

Upon his release, Jake rushed home to earn a Bible degree from Seattle Pacific College. In 1948, he returned to Japan with his new bride, Florence, as a Free Methodist missionary.

This time I was not going as a bombardier, but I was going as a missionary. How much better it is to go out to conquer evil with the gospel of peace! 

—Jacob DeShazer on his return to Japan 

Japanese people flocked to hear him and peppered him with questions. The idea that one could hold anything other than implacable hatred for one’s enemies was foreign to the Confucianist ideas that drove their culture at that time. 

Sergeant Jacob DeShazer after the war.

From Hatred to Love

There are a number of remarkable stories from Jake and Florence’s sojourn in Japan. My favorite is the one that inspired my novel. At an evangelistic meeting, Jake noticed an attractive young woman who “watched me so constantly that she began to make me self-conscious.” He asked if he could help her. She didn't reply, but the open hostility in her eyes was unmistakable.

She returned for the next meeting, and the next. Eventually, she made her confession. A bomb DeShazer deployed during the raid had snuffed out the life of a young man she loved. She attended the first meetings with a knife in her purse, determined to exact her revenge--even if it cost her everything. 

But she was so moved by Jake's example of forgiveness that she decided to follow Jesus instead. As one of Jake’s fellow missionaries wrote, “She confessed that she had first come to the meetings with the avowed purpose of killing DeShazer... But that night DeShazer had spoken of his own hatred having been changed to love. That message of God’s love worked the same change inside her...”

When I read that account, it haunted me. The young woman's name and the rest of her story are lost to history. Which was a gift, in a way. I was left to research the time period—fascinating and harrowing—and create the fictional tale of a heroine I see as deeply wounded, but committed and courageous. 

From Enemies to Fellow Evangelists

The most famous episode from DeShazer's ministry is that of Mitsuo Fuchida, who commanded the air attack on Pearl Harbor. After the war, a tract DeShazer authored was instrumental in bringing Fuchida to Christ. A few months later, the two were preaching to crowds together—the Doolittle Raider and the Japanese captain who gave the infamous “Tora-tora-tora” signal that launched the Pearl Harbor attack. They brought to thousands the message of God’s sacrificial love for all people and the power of forgiveness through Jesus Christ. (I covered Fuchida's story in more detail in my December post.)

Jake and Flo ultimately settled in Nagoya, the very city Jake had bombed. Their thirty-year ministry in Japan bore fruit in twenty-three church plants and in many changed hearts.

I'm hosting a drawing for a copy of Sarah Sundin's latest WWII novel, The Sea Before Us, for new subscribers to my newsletter. You'll also receive updates on my novel, including an opportunity to gain pre-launch access. To enter, please REGISTER HERE by Thursday, April 19. 

I stepped away from a marketing career that spanned continents to write what I love: stories of reckless faith that showcase God's hand in history. I'm so excited to work with the all-star team at Mountain Brook Ink to launch my debut novel, The Plum Blooms in Winter, this December! Inspired by a remarkable true story from World War II's pivotal Doolittle Raid, The Plum Blooms in Winter is an American Christian Fiction Writers' Genesis Contest winner. The novel follows a captured American pilot and a bereaved Japanese prostitute who targets him for ritual revenge. Please also feel free to check out my blog, Five Stones and a Sling, which hovers in the region where history meets Bible prophecy meets current events. It's rich ground--we live in a day when prophecies are leaping from the Bible's pages into the headlines!

I live outside Phoenix with my husband, a third-generation airline pilot who doubles as my Chief Military Research Officer. We share our home with two mostly-grown-up kids and a small platoon of housecats.

From Enemy to Evangelist: Mitsuo Fuchida, Lead Pilot at Pearl Harbor (PLUS a Giveaway!)

I’m sure anyone with an interest in twentieth-century history is aware that today marks the anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor—arguably the most pivotal event of the past century here.

But you might not know that the captain who directed the entire 350-plane aerial attack, who issued the famously triumphant “Tora-tora-tora” (“Tiger, tiger, tiger”) radio signal that announced that the Japanese had achieved complete surprise, would go on to provide a riveting testimony for Christ. 

Mitsuo Fuchida

Born in 1902 in a village in Nara Prefecture, Japan, Mitsuo Fuchida decided on a naval career early. In 1923, his second year at the naval academy, he took his first airplane flight and knew he’d found his calling. By 1939, Fuchida had risen to command the air group on the carrier Akagi. 

Leading the Pearl Harbor attack was “the culmination of my every waking thought,” Fuchida said, from the day in September 1941 when he was tapped for the honor. He personally masterminded methods that enabled the Japanese to use torpedoes despite the shallow waters. 

The “success” of that “day of infamy” made Fuchida a national hero, even garnering him a personal audience with Hirohito. But his nation’s resounding defeat left the proud navy captain to eke out a living as a subsistence-level farmer. 

“It was indeed a path of thorns to me.… It was a far cry from the regimentation and glamour of my military life. I was like a star that had fallen. At one moment I was Captain Mitsuo Fuchida, and the next, I was nobody!... I must admit that I was bitter and disillusioned.” 

Farming gave Fuchida time to dwell on the existential questions. He became what we would call “a seeker.” 

“Why was I still alive, when men all around me had died like flies in the four years of conflict? Gradually, I came to believe that I had been supported by some great, unseen power. 

 

"As I labored… I thought of God, creation, the miracles of the seasons, the growing plants.... I was gradually led to think in terms of a Creator of all these things. With the increasing sense of the fact of a Creator-God, I came to feel ashamed of my former godless idea that man's own power and ability were his only trustworthy guides....

 

“The problem finally resolved around a person. Who, I asked myself, could accomplish the task of banishing suspicion and war? My mind turned toward God, the creator of all things.”

Fuchida met with a friend, a former navy lieutenant who’d just repatriated from a P.O.W. camp in the U.S. The man told Fuchida about Peggy Covell, a young woman fluent in Japanese who volunteered at one of the camps where he’d been confined. 

When asked why she was so kind to the prisoners, Peggy stunned the men. “Because my parents were killed by the Japanese Army.” 

Peggy's parents, Prof. James and Charma Covell, served for twenty years as Baptist missionaries in Japan. They were among the "Hopevale Martyrs" the Japanese Army executed in December 1943 in the Philippines as spies. (Look for that story in my next post.)

"Missionary Kid" Peggy Covell had a profound impact
on P.O.W.s she served--and ultimately, on
thousands more back in Japan. Look for my post on the
"Hopevale Martyrs" next month (1/28).

Her stance mystified Fuchida, who “could not understand such enemy-forgiving love. I had never heard of people returning good for evil. I desired all the more to discover the source of this power that could remove hatred from the hearts of people…” 

A few months later, Fuchida was called to Tokyo on an errand, where a missionary “happened” to hand him a tract authored by Doolittle Raider Jacob DeShazer. The tract recounted how, motivated by “bitter hatred” for the Japanese after Pearl Harbor, Jacob volunteered to serve as a bombardier on the daring vengeance raid--which Cindy K. Stewart has been highlighting in her posts. DeShazer was captured in China along with seven other Raiders. 

If you saw the movie or read the book Unbroken you'll have a picture of what these men endured. But where Louis Zamperini was a prisoner for a little more than two years, Doolittle’s “lost crews” remained in Japanese prison camps 

...for forty long months, 34 of them in solitary confinement. We were imprisoned and beaten, half-starved, terribly tortured, and denied by solitary confinement even the comfort of association with one another. Three of my buddies were executed by a firing squad about six months after our capture and 14 months later, another one of them died of slow starvation.... The bitterness of my heart against my captors seemed more than I could bear.

- Corporal Jacob DeShazer in his tract I Was a Prisoner of Japan

Tokyo, April 1942. Jacob DeShazer's crewmate and fellow
prisoner Lieutenant Robert Hite.

The four surviving prisoners eventually received the gift of a Bible. What DeShazer read during those miserable hours transformed him. Alone in his cell, he recognized his need for a Savior and accepted Jesus. 

The Lord revealed to Jake that He wanted to give the Japanese people an illustration of the meaning of forgiveness. Jake was to be that walking object lesson. In 1948, he returned to Japan as a Free Methodist missionary. 

This time I was not going as a bombardier, but I was going as a missionary. How much better it is to go out to conquer evil with the gospel of peace!

- Jacob DeShazer on his return to Japan

Reading DeShazer’s tract, Fuchida was confronted again with the transforming power of Jesus Christ. “I became more ashamed than ever of my own revengeful spirit.” 

He bought a Bible and read it. The final chapters of Luke’s gospel furnished the answers he’d been seeking. 

“Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” (Luke 23:24)

Fuchida knew he’d reached the end of a “long, long wandering…”

“Jesus prayed for the very soldiers who were about to thrust his side with the spear. I am not ashamed to say that my eyes filled with tears. I accepted Jesus as my personal Savior.”

A few months later, the two were preaching to crowds together—Mitsuo Fuchida, the lead pilot at Pearl Harbor and Jacob DeShazer, the Doolittle Raid bombardier. They brought to thousands the message of God’s sacrificial love for all people and the power of Jesus Christ to bring forgiveness from sin. 

Giveaway:

Would you like to read more of Mitsuo Fuchida's story in his own words? I'm giving away three copies of his book-length personal testimony, From Pearl Harbor to Calvary! (Kindle edition.) Register for the drawing here by Sunday December 10. You'll also receive updates on The Plum Blooms in Winter, my debut novel inspired by the story of Jake DeShazer and Doolittle's "lost crews." 

The Plum Blooms in Winter is an American Christian Fiction Writers' Genesis winner. Inspired by a remarkable true story from World War II's pivotal Doolittle Raid, the novel follows a captured American pilot and a bereaved Japanese woman who targets him for ritual revenge. It launches next October from Mountain Brook Ink.

I live just outside Phoenix with my husband, a third-generation airline pilot who doubles as my Chief Military Research Officer. We share our home with two all-grown-up kids and a small platoon of housecats.

The Ancient Art of Kintsugi with a Giveaway

With Nancy J. Farrier

Bowl repaired with staples

I have become fascinated by the art of kintsugi and thought you might be interested in learning about this way of repairing the broken so the cracks become a work of beauty. The art form traces back to 1500’s Japan.

The consensus seems to be that a Japanese shogun in the 15^th century had a treasured tea bowl that broke. He wanted the bowl repaired, but the first repair was done with staples that detracted from the beauty of the bowl. He then engaged another person to fix the bowl. This time the cracks were filled with lacquer mixed with gold, which enhanced the original beauty of the bowl. Thus the art of kintsugi was born.

Photo by Haragayato

Kintsugi means, “golden joinery,” and the original lacquer used came from the sap of the urushi tree. The sap is an irritant similar to poison ivy or poison oak, so the artisan using this lacquer either often paid a price to use the sap for repairs. Most wear gloves to protect the hands. (Once the sap is processed and dried in the cracks it is no longer an irritant and the person using the pottery item is safe from harm.) Those who worked with the sap often built up an immunity to its harmful properties.

Lacquer Tree, photo by Aomorikuma

While many artisans today, who perform repairs in the kintsugi method, use a polymer fixative, there are some who adhere to the traditional method. The Japanese lacquer is preferred by many for the higher content of urushiol, the derivative of the sap of the urushi tree. Japanese lacquer has a 75% content of urusiol where the Chinese lacquer has only 15%.

Courtesy of Lakeside Pottery Studio

Courtesy of Lakeside Pottery Studio

From my research, I discovered the crack, or break, is repaired with the lacquer to make a stable bond. Then a mixture that contains gold is put over the repaired crack to make what is often viewed as an ugly crack into something beautiful. Instead of discarding a treasured item, we can enjoy the renewed usefulness. Not only that, but we can share the story with people who visit and see the repaired piece

Courtesy of Lakeside Pottery Studio

Courtesy of Lakeside Pottery Studio

Courtesy of Lakeside Pottery Studio

Why am I so fascinated with kintsugi? So many times we are wounded, or injured in some way by life. We are taught to hide those inner injuries, or broken places, but this form of art teaches us that our past hurts are not ugly, but can become a beautiful part of who we are. Instead of hiding in shame, we can be an example to others and share healing with others who are going through a similar difficulty.

Photo by A Kintsugi Life

There are many places to purchase the supplies to do your own kintsugi repairs. You can take classes to learn this ancient art, or even watch videos online. If you have a treasured piece that you don’t want to throw away, consider learning this art, or even having an artisan do the repair for you. Some of the pictures I have contain links to shops that sell kintsugi pieces, or offer to do repairs.

Photo by A Kintsugi Life

What do you think of this art form? Have you had anything broken that you would have liked to repair in this manner? Do you have broken places in your life that could become places of beauty to help others? I would love to hear from you. This month I am giving away a kintsugi necklace to someone who leaves a comment answering one of the questions above. The winner must be in the United States and must respond on the blog by midnight today.



For today's blog, I have been in contact with two businesses who have supplied photos and encouragement. Please take a moment and drop by their websites. Patty and Morty from Lakeside Pottery Studio provided more photos than I could use. They have some lovely kintsugi pottery available here. A Kintsugi Life owner, Kenetha, was thrilled to have me share some of her kintsugi jewelry pictures. She has some wonderful pieces on her website.

Nancy J Farrier is an award winning author who lives in Southern California in the Mojave Desert. She loves the Southwest with its interesting historical past. Nancy and her husband have five children and two grandsons. When Nancy isn’t writing, she loves to read, do needlecraft, play with her cats, and spend time with her family. Nancy is represented by Karen Ball of The Steve Laube Literary Agency. You can read more about Nancy and her books on her website: nancyjfarrier.com.