The Japanese Tea Ceremony in America

Although in its planning stages, I am interested in producing a documentary video on the aesthetics of the Japanese tea bowl, its connection to traditional tea ceremony and its evolved role in American culture.

My proposal is to work with a Japanese ceramic art expert and several Bay Area tea masters to analyze the tea bowl and the sometimes deeply personal connections practitioners of tea have to these objects. Tea practitioners will be interviewed with their tea bowl collection and asked to identify the qualities of the object that make it right for use in tea practice.

The focus of this documentary will be to educate contemporary American ceramic artists, the Western makers of these objects, to the qualities that the user is looking for. In addition, we will discuss the scale and ergonomics of the American style tea bowl to be used by Americans in a traditional Japanese tea ceremony.