ORIBE WARE

type of Japanese ceramics, usually glazed in blue or green and first appearing during the Keicho and Genna eras (15961624). The name Oribe is derived from Furuta Oribe, a pupil of Sen Rikyu, under whose guidance it was first produced. Some Oribe utensils and functional objects were made in standard ceramic shapes and forms. Others, however, were deliberately deformed by a distortion or imbalance to create a new aesthetic sensibility. The blue-green vitriol glazes have the lustre of fine glass, and the decorative motifs, which are drawn in an iron glaze, have the same imaginative and modernistic feeling found in contemporary textiles and lacquerware. Many of the motifs are exotic, probably deriving from foreign imports arriving at the port of Sakai (just south of Osaka), which was also the original home of Sen Riky u.