January 2024, Kyoto Japan

Kawai Kanjiro was a ceramicist, writer, thinker and furniture maker whose home and studio is open to visit in Kaneicho, Kyoto. The property is extraordinary, it seems to almost vibrate. Tess and I spent as much time as our children would afford us, just sitting in his carved timber chairs and taking in the energy of the home.

A cat scratched through a long worn timber door frame which had been almost reduced to the thickness of paper, but everywhere else, everything just seemed to have its place.

I imagine talking with Kawai would not have felt any different to our sitting there in his home, in its place, in a gentle humming harmony.

I would like our work to have this essence. To be ‘of its place’, an expression of the artist's hands and of its site and inhabitant; restfully open to interpretation by a tourist some day.

Sitting with one of my 14 year old sons at the base of this illuminated paper void is a moment. He, audibly bored, me awash with the feeling of something special. Both of us together in Kyoto in this home and gallery, perhaps one of the more sublime architectural experiences I have had. There is a lot of space above us, both literally and metaphorically; there is a lot of space for us to fill as a father and son. Perhaps one day we will be sitting side by side on that mezzanine.