:Bernard Leach

Leach was born in Hong Kong.{{Cite journal |last=White |first=Moira |date=2022-11-02 |title=Mid-20th century British ceramics in Aotearoa |url=https://tuhinga.arphahub.com/article/82337/ |journal=Tuhinga |language=en |volume=33 |pages=33–46 |doi=10.3897/tuhinga.33.82337 |doi-access=free |issn=2253-5861}} His mother Eleanor (née Sharp) died in childbirth. He spent his first three years in Japan with his father, Andrew Leach, until he moved back to Hong Kong in 1890.

Leach attended the Slade School of Fine Art and the London School of Art, where he studied etching under Frank Brangwyn.{{cite web|title=Bernard Leach Life & Work|url=http://www.japansociety.org.uk/2677/bernard-leach-life-work/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160928011722/http://www.japansociety.org.uk/2677/bernard-leach-life-work/|archive-date=2016-09-28|access-date=25 September 2016|website=The Japan Society of the UK}} Reading books by Lafcadio Hearn, he became interested in Japan. In 1909 he returned to Japan with his young wife Muriel (née Hoyle) intending to teach etching. Satomi Ton, Kojima Kikuo, and later Ryūsei Kishida were his pupils.

File:Kishida Leach.jpg]]

In Tokyo, he gave talks and attended meetings along with Mushanokōji Saneatsu, Shiga Naoya, Yanagi Sōetsu and others from the "Shirakaba-Group",Shirakaba ="The Birch" ({{lang|ja|白樺}}) was an influential cultural magazine at that time. who were trying to introduce western art to Japan after 250 years of seclusion.

About 1911 he attended a Raku-yaki pottery party which was his first introduction to ceramics, and through introduction by Ishii Hakutei, he began to study under Urano Shigekichi {{lang|ja|浦野繁吉}} (1851–1923), who stood as Kenzan 6th in the tradition of potter Ogata Kenzan (1663–1743). Assisting as interpreter for technical terms was the potter Tomimoto Kenkichi, whom he had met already earlier. From this time Leach wrote articles for the Shirakaba.

In 1913 he also drafted covers for Shirakaba and Fyūzan.A cultural magazine. Fyūzan = French fusain, charcoal pencil. Attracted by the Prussian philosopher and art scholar Alfred Westharp, who at the time was living in Peking, Leach moved to Peking in 1915. There he took on the Name {{lang|zh|李奇聞}} (for "Leach"), but returned the following year to Japan. It was the year 1919, when young Hamada Shōji visited Leach for the first time. Leach received a kiln from Kenzan and built it up in Yanagi's garden and called it Tōmon-gama. Now established as a potter, he decided to move to England.

In 1920, before leaving, he had an exhibition in Osaka, where he met the potter Kawai Kanjirō. In Tokyo, a farewell exhibition was organized.

File:Bernard Leach Pottery Studio St.Ives (3983807863).jpg, St Ives, Cornwall]]

Leach returned to England in 1920 on the invitation of Frances Horne. Horne was establishing a Guild of Handicrafts within the existing artist colony of St Ives in Cornwall. On the recommendation of a family friend, Edgar Skinner, she contacted Leach to suggest that he become the potter within this group. Leach and his wife Muriel were accompanied by the young Hamada Shoji and, having identified a suitable site next to the Stennack river on the outskirts of St Ives, the two established the Leach Pottery in 1920. They constructed a traditional Japanese climbing kiln or 'Noborigama (登り窯)', the first built in the West.Leach, Bernard. (1990). Hamada, Potter. Foreword by Warren MacKenzie. Kodansha International 1990 [1975] The kiln was poorly built and was reconstructed in 1923 by Matsubayashi Tsurunosuke (1894-1932).

In 1934, Leach and Mark Tobey travelled together through France and Italy, then sailed from Naples to Hong Kong and Shanghai, where they parted company, Leach heading on to Japan.

Leach formally joined the Baháʼí Faith in 1940 after being introduced to it by Mark Tobey, who was himself a Baháʼí.{{Cite web|date=2020-10-14|title=Pioneering pottery sought unity of East and West|url=https://news.bahai.org/story/1458/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201028122001/https://news.bahai.org/story/1458|archive-date=2020-10-28|access-date=2021-08-26|website=Bahá'í World News Service|language=en}} A pilgrimage to the Baháʼí shrines in Haifa, Israel, during 1954 intensified his feeling that he should do more to unite the East and West by returning to the Orient "to try more honestly to do my work there as a Baháʼí and as an artist..."Weinberg, Robert (1999). Spinning the Clay into Stars: Bernard Leach and the Baháʼí Faith, pp. 21, 29.

Leach promoted pottery as a combination of Western and Eastern arts and philosophies. His work focused on traditional Korean, Japanese and Chinese pottery, in combination with traditional techniques from England and Germany, such as slipware and salt glaze ware. He saw pottery as a combination of art, philosophy, design and craft – even as a greater lifestyle. A Potter's Book (1940) defined Leach's craft philosophy and techniques; it went through many editions and was his breakthrough to recognition.

Image:Leach pottery-soup bowl.JPG

Leach advocated simple and utilitarian forms. His ethical pots stand in opposition to what he called fine art pots, which promoted aesthetic concerns rather than function.{{Cite web |date=2007-05-16 |title=Twentieth Century British Ceramics in the Victoria and Albert Museum |url=http://www.studiopotter.org/reviews/?review=book020 |access-date=2022-02-17 |website=Studio Potter Magazine |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070516135019/http://www.studiopotter.org/reviews/?review=book020 |archive-date=16 May 2007 |url-status=dead}} Popularized in the 1940s after the publication of A Potter's Book, his style had lasting influence on counter-culture and modern design in North America during the 1950s and 1960s. Leach's pottery produced a range of "standard ware" handmade pottery for the general public. He continued to produce pots which were exhibited as works of art.{{Cite web|date=2021-02-26|title=The Leach Pottery: a living tradition|url=https://www.ceramicreview.com/articles/the-leach-pottery/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210226041414/https://www.ceramicreview.com/articles/the-leach-pottery/|archive-date=2021-02-26|access-date=2022-02-17|website=Ceramic Review}}

Many potters from all over the world were apprenticed at the Leach Pottery, and spread Leach's style and beliefs. His British associates and trainees include Michael Cardew, Katherine Pleydell-Bouverie, David Leach (his son), Janet Darnell (whom Leach married in 1956) and William Marshall. Another of his students at St Ives was William Worrall who became chief craftsman at the Chalice Well crafts guild in Glastonbury and Muriel Bell, co-founder of the Lanchester Marionettes.{{cite news |date=2002-10-08 |work=Evening Despatch |author=E.S.F. |title=A Midland Woman's Diary |url= https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0000671/19360728/008/0008 |page=8 |location=Birmingham, UK }} His American apprentices include Warren MacKenzie (who likewise influenced many potters through his teaching at the University of Minnesota), Byron Temple. He was a major influence on New Zealand potter Len Castle who travelled to London to spend time working with him in the mid-1950s. Another apprentice was an Indian potter Nirmala Patwardhan who developed the so-called Nirmala glaze based on an 11th-century Chinese technique. His four Canadian apprentices, John Reeve, Glenn Lewis, Michael Henry and Ian Steele helped to shape the pottery scene in Vancouver and the Canadian west coast during the 1960 and 1970s.{{Cite web|last=Lambley|first=Alex|title=Mingei and its Transnational Reception: The Translation and Appropriation of Mingei Theory and Practice by Bernard Leach's four Vancouver Apprentices (1958-1979)|url=https://www.leachpottery.com/alex-lambley|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220115150305/https://www.leachpottery.com/alex-lambley|archive-date=2022-01-15|access-date=2022-02-15|website=The Leach Pottery|language=en-GB}}{{Cite book|last=Allison|first=Glenn|url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/890000099|title=Thrown : British Columbia's apprentices of Bernard Leach and their contemporaries|date=2011|publisher=Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery|isbn=978-1-908966-99-5|location=Vancouver, BC|oclc=890000099}} The Cypriot potter Valentinos Charalambous trained with Leach in 1950-51.Marion Whybrow, The Leach Legacy: St Ives Pottery and its Influence (1996){{Cite web|title=Valentinos CHARALAMBOUS {{!}} Cornwall Artists Index|url=https://cornwallartists.org/cornwall-artists/valentinos-charalambous|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210629210939/https://cornwallartists.org/cornwall-artists/valentinos-charalambous|archive-date=2021-06-29|access-date=2022-02-15|website=Cornwall Artists Index|language=en}}

Leach was instrumental, with Muriel Rose, in organising the only International Conference of Potters and Weavers in July 1952 at Dartington Hall, where he had been working and teaching.{{cite book|last1=Vacher|first1=Jean|url=https://issuu.com/studiohyde/docs/murielrose|title=Muriel Rose: A Modern Crafts Legacy|year=2006|isbn=978-0-9554374-0-3|location=Farnham|access-date=30 June 2020}} It included exhibitions of British pottery and textiles since 1920, Mexican folk art, and works by conference participants, among them Shoji Hamada and US-based Bauhaus potter Marguerite Wildenhain. Another important contributor was Japanese aesthetician Soetsu Yanagi, author of The Unknown Craftsman. According to Brent Johnson, "The most important outcome of the conference was that it helped organize the modern studio pottery movement by giving a voice to the people who became its leaders...it gave them [Leach, Hamada and Yanagi] celebrity status...[while] Marguerite Wildenhain emerged from Dartington Hall as the most important craft potter in America."Johnson, Brent, "A Matter of Tradition" in Marguerite Wildenhain and the Bauhaus: An Eyewitness Anthology, (Dean and Geraldine Schwarz, eds.), p. __. He was an active member of the Red Rose Guild.{{cite book |date=2000 |last=Backemeyer |first=Sylvia |title=Making their mark: art, craft and design at the Central School, 1896-1966 |publisher=Herbert Press |location=London |page=114 |isbn= 0713658622}}

File:Three works by Bernard Leach, V&A London.jpg

Leach continued to produce work until 1972 and never ended his passion for travelling. He continued to write about ceramics even after losing his eyesight.{{Cite web|title=Omnibus: The Art of the Potter|url=https://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/11ff8121e4504be1980f22e2b95eba36|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220218092338/https://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/11ff8121e4504be1980f22e2b95eba36|archive-date=2022-02-18|access-date=2022-02-18|website=genome.ch.bbc.co.uk|date=2 February 1975 |quote=Sun 2nd Feb 1975 ... 88-year-old Bernard Leach, now nearly blind ...}}{{Cite book|last1=Leach|first1=Bernard|url=http://archive.org/details/artofbernardleac00leac|title=The art of Bernard Leach|last2=Hogben|first2=Carol|last3=Victoria and Albert Museum|date=1978|publisher=New York : Watson-Guptill Publications|others=Internet Archive|isbn=978-0-8230-0263-4}}

The Victoria and Albert Museum in London held a major exhibition of his art in 1977.{{Cite book|last=Houston|first=John|title=The Art of Bernard Leach: a Loan Retrospective Exhibition, March to May 1977. Catalogue of the exhibition held at the Victoria and Albert Museum.|publisher=Victoria and Albert Museum|year=1977}}

The Leach Pottery remains in operation, accompanied by a museum displaying many pieces by Leach and his students.{{Cite web|title=The Leach Pottery|url=https://www.leachpottery.com/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220212175155/https://www.leachpottery.com/|archive-date=2022-02-12|access-date=2021-11-24|website=The Leach Pottery|language=en-GB}}

• Charles Fergus Binns Medal for Excellence in Ceramics, 1950{{Cite news|date=1950-04-25|title=Ceramic Profs, Seniors Attend ACS Conclave|volume=36|pages=1|work=Fiat Lux|publisher=Alfred University|issue=21|url=https://aura.alfred.edu/bitstream/handle/10829/1932/19500425.pdf?sequence=1|access-date=2022-02-19}}
• Japan Foundation Cultural Award, 1974{{Cite web|title=Awards and Special Prizes: Recipients List|url=https://www.jpf.go.jp/e/about/award/index.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201129170030/https://www.jpf.go.jp/e/about/award/archive/archive1973-1995.html|archive-date=2020-11-29|access-date=2022-02-15|website=The Japan Foundation - The Japan Foundation Awards}}
• Member of the Order of the Companions of Honour, 1973 (UK)Bernard Leach archive: [https://archive.today/20120728145839/http://www.archiveshub.ac.uk/news/04070901.html bio notes]
• Order of the Sacred Treasure, 1966 (Japan)Sims, Barbara R. (1998). [http://bahai-library.com/east-asia/divine.flag/chapter13.html Unfurling the Divine Flag in Tokyo, p. 66.] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061103193959/http://bahai-library.com/east-asia/divine.flag/chapter13.html |date=3 November 2006 }}
• Commander of the Order of the British Empire, 1962{{Cite web|last=van Kerkhoff|first=Sonja|title=Arts Dialogue : Bahá´í Association for the Arts|url=http://bahai-library.com/bafa/l/leach.htm|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210626005506/http://bahai-library.com/bafa/l/leach.htm|archive-date=2021-06-26|access-date=2022-02-15|website=bahai-library.com}}

Edmund de Waal, British ceramic artist and writer, was apprenticed to the potter Geoffrey Whiting, a disciple of Leach, at the King's School, Canterbury in the early 1980's.Ceramics: Art and Perception, No. 54, 2003. He has said that to move on, he had to address Leach directly. "It's anxiety of influence – you choose which father to kill, and in my case it was Leach."{{Cite news |last=Wullschläger |first=Jackie |author-link=Jackie Wullschläger |date=2014-03-28 |title=Lunch with the FT: Edmund de Waal |url=https://www.ft.com/content/835ade90-b4f0-11e3-af92-00144feabdc0 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171025073431/https://www.ft.com/content/835ade90-b4f0-11e3-af92-00144feabdc0 |archive-date=2017-10-25 |access-date=2024-02-02 |work=Financial Times}} He researched Leach's papers and journals in the archive room of the Japanese Folk Crafts Museum.de Waal, Edmund.The Hare with Amber Eyes: a hidden inheritance. Vintage, 2011, p. 3. {{ISBN|978-0-09-953955-1}}.

De Waal's book, the first critical monograph on Leach, was published in 1998.{{Cite book |title=Bernard Leach |date=1997 |publisher=Tate Gallery Publ |isbn=978-1-85437-227-7 |editor-last=Leach |editor-first=Bernard |series=St. Ives artists |location=London |quote=Though Leach wrote extensively on himself and his work, there has been no biography or critical monograph published. |editor-last2=De Waal |editor-first2=Edmund}} He described it as "the first 'de-mystifying' study of Leach", writing in the last chapter: "In the West, Leach has been seen as 'a natural child of the East', someone who 'understood' Japan by birthright and in an almost mystical way. In the East, he has been credited with seeing deeper into the culture of Japan than any Westerner since Lafcadio Hearn".{{Cite web|last=de Waal|first=Edmund|date=|title=Prof. Edmund de Waal|url=http://www.wmin.ac.uk:80/mad/page-766|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20051206011844/http://www.wmin.ac.uk:80/mad/page-766|archive-date=2005-12-06|access-date=2022-02-15|website=University of Westminster}}{{Cite book |title=Bernard Leach |date=1997 |publisher=Tate Gallery Publ |isbn=978-1-85437-227-7 |editor-last=Leach |editor-first=Bernard |series=St. Ives artists |location=London |pages=71 |editor-last2=De Waal |editor-first2=Edmund}}

Studying the circumstances of his grounding in Japanese culture, he pointed out that Leach could "barely speak" Japanese at the time of his training with Kenzan VI.{{Cite book |title=Bernard Leach |date=1997 |publisher=Tate Gallery Publ |isbn=978-1-85437-227-7 |editor-last=Leach |editor-first=Bernard |series=St. Ives artists |location=London |pages=15 |editor-last2=De Waal |editor-first2=Edmund}} De Waal also notes that poetry used in the tradition of Kenzan I would not be legible to Leach, who would straightforwardly say that he could not read Japanese texts.{{Cite book |title=Bernard Leach |date=1997 |publisher=Tate Gallery Publ |isbn=978-1-85437-227-7 |editor-last=Leach |editor-first=Bernard |series=St. Ives artists |location=London |pages=64 |editor-last2=De Waal |editor-first2=Edmund}} Leach did learn to speak the language to a conversational standard, however; recordings of this are held by the Mingei Film Archive and the Crafts Study Centre, Farnham.{{Cite web|date=2020-12-20|title=The life and legacy of Bernard Leach {{!}} Apollo Magazine|url=https://www.apollo-magazine.com/bernard-leach-centenary/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201220201141/https://www.apollo-magazine.com/bernard-leach-centenary/|archive-date=2020-12-20|access-date=2022-02-18|website=Apollo Magazine}} The book acknowledges Leach's strength as an artist, his sophisticated mark-making and sensitivity to the surface qualities of the clay, while providing an examination of the Orientalism in his thinking and making.{{Cite book |title=Bernard Leach |date=1997 |publisher=Tate Gallery Publ |isbn=978-1-85437-227-7 |editor-last=Leach |editor-first=Bernard |series=St. Ives artists |location=London |pages=74 |editor-last2=De Waal |editor-first2=Edmund}}

• 1940: A Potter's Book. London: Faber and Faber
• New edition, with introductions by Soyetsu Yanagi and Michael Cardew. London: Faber and Faber, 1976, {{ISBN|978-0-571-10973-9}}
• 1978: Beyond East and West: Memoirs, Portraits and Essays. London: Faber and Faber
• New edition, London: Faber and Faber, {{ISBN|978-0-571-11692-8}}
• 1988: Drawings, Verse & Belief [http://www.Oneworld-Publications.com Oneworld Publications]; 3rd edition, {{ISBN|978-1-85168-012-2}}

{{Portal|Cornwall}}

• Sardar Gurcharan Singh

{{Reflist|2}}

• Olding, Simon. (2010). The Etchings of Bernard Leach, Crafts Study Centre.
• Johnson, Brent. (2007). "A Matter of Tradition"
• Cooper, Emmanuel. (2003). Bernard Leach Life & Work. New Haven: Yale University Press. {{ISBN|0-300-09929-0}} (cloth)
• Johnson, Brent. (2007). "A Matter of Tradition" in [https://books.google.com/books?id=LDquGAAACAAJ&q=Marguerite+Wildenhain+and+the+Bauhaus:+An+Eyewitness+Anthology Wildenhain and the Bauhaus: An Eyewitness Anthology] Dean and Geraldine Schwarz, eds.. Decorah, Iowa: South Bear Press. {{ISBN|978-0-9761381-2-9}} (cloth)
• Watson, Oliver. (1997). Bernard Leach: Potter and Artist, London: Crafts Council.
• Weinberg, Robert. (1999). [https://books.google.com/books?id=ViapAAAACAAJ&q=Spinning+the+Clay+into+Stars:+Bernard+Leach+and+the+Bah%C3%A1%27%C3%AD+Faith Spinning the Clay into Stars: Bernard Leach and the Baháʼí Faith.] Oxford: George Ronald Publishers. {{ISBN|978-0-85398-440-5}} (paper)
• Ohara Museum of Art/Asahi Shimbun (1980): An Exhibition of the Art of Bernard Leach. Catalogue in Japanese.
• Sōetsu Yanagi: The Unknown Craftsman. Foreword by Shōji Hamada. Adapted by Bernard Leach. Kodansha International, 1972.
• Leach, Bernard. (1990). Hamada, Potter. Foreword by Warren MacKenzie. Kodansha International 1990 [1975].

{{Library resources box|by=yes|onlinebooks=no|about=yes|wikititle=Bernard Leach}}

{{commons}}

{{Wikiquote}}

• [http://www.leachpottery.com Leach Pottery]
• [http://www.vads.ac.uk/learning/learndex.php?theme_id=CSCU7&theme_record_id=cscu7int&mtri=cscu7int Further information] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081206010348/http://www.vads.ac.uk/learning/learndex.php?theme_id=CSCU7&theme_record_id=cscu7int&mtri=cscu7int |date=6 December 2008 }}
• [http://www.studiopottery.com/cgi-bin/mp.cgi?item=3 Studio Pottery]
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20110721213313/http://www.vads.ahds.ac.uk/results.php?cmd=advsearch&words=bernard+leach+source+collection&field=description&oper=or&words2=&field2=collection&mode=boolean&CSC=1&submit.x=14&submit.y=14 Leach Source Collection] and [https://web.archive.org/web/20110721213344/http://www.vads.ahds.ac.uk/results.php?cmd=advsearch&words=leach+archive&field=subject&oper=or&words2=&field2=collection&mode=boolean&CSC=1&submit.x=10&submit.y=17 Bernard Leach Archive] held at the Crafts Study Centre and hosted online by the [https://web.archive.org/web/20071012233436/http://vads.ahds.ac.uk/index.php Visual Arts Data Service (VADS)]
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20070928043836/http://www.search.exploringthepotteries.org.uk/engine/theme/default.asp?theme=686 Historic Leach pottery] at [https://web.archive.org/web/20060519082752/http://www2002.stoke.gov.uk/museums/ Stoke-on-Trent Museums]
• {{cite web

|publisher=Victoria and Albert Museum

|url=http://www.vam.ac.uk/collections/ceramics/object_stories/accidental_masterpiece/index.html

|title=Accidental Masterpiece

|work=Ceramics

|access-date=23 July 2007

|url-status=dead

|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070929133752/http://www.vam.ac.uk/collections/ceramics/object_stories/accidental_masterpiece/index.html

|archive-date=29 September 2007

|df=dmy

}}

• {{cite web |publisher= Victoria and Albert Museum

|url= http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/c/ceramics-points-of-view-bernard-leachs-cup-and-saucer/

|title= Bernard Leach, 'Cup and Saucer'

|work=Ceramics

|access-date= 9 December 2007}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Leach, Bernard}}

Category:1887 births

Category:1979 deaths

Category:Arts and Crafts movement artists

Category:English potters

Category:St Ives artists

Category:Commanders of the Order of the British Empire

Category:Members of the Order of the Companions of Honour

Category:British people of Hong Kong descent

Category:English Bahá'ís

Category:Converts to the Bahá'í Faith

Category:20th-century Bahá'ís

Category:Recipients of the Order of the Sacred Treasure, 2nd class

Category:Cornish pottery

Category:20th-century British ceramists

Category:Mingei

Category:Member of Red Rose Guild

Category:Craft Centre of Great Britain member