金 - Kin means gold
継ぎ - Tsugi means patch
As the name implies, kintsugi is essentially patching (ceramics) with gold. The concept came around in the 1400s when a nobleman broke a cup and sent it to China to be repaired. It was returned repaired with metal staples, as was standard at the time. However, the owner disliked the appearance of it and hired Japanese craftsmen to take on the task of making it more aesthetically pleasing. They came up kintsugi, which involved sealing the cracks with a lacquer and gold powder mixture. This not only emphasized and beautified the breakage, it often encouraged people to more frequently "accidentally" break their pottery!
Below is a short video about kintsugi craftsmen:
And here is a picture of something I made a couple years back in a ceramics class.. Parts of it were inspired by kintsugi - some legs broke off by accident, some were on purpose, and I thought this would be perfect for it - though I didn't use lacquer. I used metallic acrylic paint, wire, and metal sheets!
When the Japanese mend broken objects, they aggrandize the damage by filling the cracks with gold. They believe that when something's suffered damage and has a history it becomes more beautiful.
ReplyDeleteI know with real estate, they tend to prefer to rebuild when they move. They don't like living in a "used" house because of bad spirits and stuff. It's pretty amazing how they manage to take down houses when everything is so close together.
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