Imari porcelain is the European collectors' name for Japanese wares made at Arita, in the former Hizen Province, northwestern Kyushu, and exported from the port of Imari, Saga specifically for the European export trade.

Imari was simply the trans-shipment port for Arita wares. The kilns at Arita formed the heart of the Japanese porcelain industry, which developed in the course of the 17th century, after the white kaolin clay was discovered, and came to rival the output of the Chinese kilns at Ching-te-Chen. Blue-and-white porcelain made at Arita was also widely exported to Europe through the Dutch East India Company, but "Imari porcelain" connotes wares more specifically designed to catch the European taste.

Though sophisticated wares in authentic Japanese taste were being made at Arita for the fastidious home market, European export porcelains made use of enamel colors over underglaze cobalt blue and iron red, often with copious gilding, sometimes with spare isolated sprigged vignettes, but often densely patterned in compartments. Globular Imari teapots with swan-necked spouts helped establish the classic European form for these new necessities of life.

Early experiments with overglaze colored enamels at Arita are associated with the famous Sakaida Kakiemon (1596-1666), whose name is memorialized in "Kakiemon" ware. Dutch traders had a monopoly on the insatiable export trade, the first large order being placed at Arita by the Dutch East India Company in 1656. The trade peaked in the late 17th century and was slowly replaced by Chinese kilns in the early 18th century, as social conditions in China settled with the full establishment of the Qing Dynasty. Very fine "Chinese Imari" export wares were produced in the 18th century, eclipsing the original Japanese exports.

Chinese Imari patterns and "Kakiemon" designs and palette of colors influenced some early Orientalizing wares produced by the porcelain manufactories at Meissen, or later at Vincennes.

European centers imitated the gaudy and consciously "barbaric" taste of "Imari" wares, first copied in faience at Delft in Holland. In the early 19th century, Chamberlain 's factory at Worcester copied Imari "gaudy" ware.

See also

• Kakiemon pottery
• Japanese pottery

External link

• About Imari porcelain