25. Otagaki Rengetsu

RENGETSU, Otagaki Rengetsu

大田垣蓮月

One of the most inerrant names in the history of Kyoto pottery, is that of Otagaki Rengetsu. She was not only a potter, but also a calligrapher and painter, and above all a poet of wakas, a classical poetic form of 31 syllables. In Japan, she is considered one of the greatest poets of the 19th century. In her pottery, she sought not perfection but purity and authenticity, with her engraved poetry also forming an important and integral part of the object itself. Rengetsu pottery (蓮月焼, Rengetsu-yaki) is the name for the type of pottery produced by her, but continued to be produced long after her death,especially in Okazaki, a district near the eastern mountains of Kyoto, where she lived and worked for much of her life.

Otagaki Rengetsu was born on 8 January 1791 in Kyoto and was given the name Nobu. Her mother is said to have been a geisha and her father a high samurai, Todo Yoshikiyo. Her mother abandoned Nobu when she was only a few weeks old. At her father's request, she was adopted by Yamazaki Teruhisa, a samurai of the Otagaki clan who worked as a servant at the Chionin temple where her real father Yoshikyo also stayed. She learned to write poetry, dance and sew as a woman was supposed to do in those days, but was also proficient in martial arts, horse riding and sword fighting. Her life as a young adult was marked by many personal tragedies with the loss of two husbands and five children when she was only 31. She then decided to shave off her hair and take a vow as a Buddhist monk. She took the name Rengetsu (Lotus Moon) and lived with her stepfather near the Chion'in temple. Only after his death in 1832 did Rengetsu start making her lotus-shaped pottery, which she sold to earn a living. With her unique combination of pottery, calligraphy and poetry, Rengetsu achieved great fame far beyond the borders of Kyōto during her lifetime. She earned a lot of money, but also gave away almost everything and lived her life in very modest circumstances. Rengetsu continued to work into old age. She died in 1875, aged 85. Rengetsu's grave still stands under the cherry trees in Kyoto's Kotani cemetery.

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