Way of Tea » tea culture

Tea Links & News — Feb 2012

Blake Harvey — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 05:22:21 +0000

The essentials of The Way of Tea

Kohei examines Rikyu’s seven essential practices when following The Way of Tea.
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Omotesenke guide to Tea Ceremony

The Omotesenke Tea School has a great online guide to Tea Ceremony covering everything from history to etiquette to tea utensils.
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British ‘rakugo’ artist helps Tohoku smile

When the March 11 tsunami wiped out Tohoku coastal towns, British “rakugo” comic storyteller Diane Orrett was at home in Osaka, watching TV footage of the waves obliterating places she had visited and crying, not knowing what to do. But she was immediately presented with a chance to help survivors in the devastated northeast, as organizers canceled all her bookings the day after the Great East Japan Earthquake, deeming rakugo performances to be inappropriate at a time when the whole nation was in a state of shock and bewilderment. Finding her schedule suddenly empty, Orrett, who goes by the stage name Diane Kichijitsu and is also a balloon artist, headed to Miyagi Prefecture in early April for a five-day visit armed with lots of balloons, hoping to use them to put a smile on children’s faces.
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Matsue’s sweets makers take wares to New York

A project launched in 2004 by the city of Matsue, on the Sea of Japan, to promote its local specialty in New York City, is finally bearing fruit. Local businesses and the city’s chamber of commerce recently took a long-awaited step to sell traditional Japanese sweets by launching their second and third outlets in New York.
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Ochamori Tea Ceremony

All the tea utensils are giant! I haven’t heard or seen this type of tea ceremony before!
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New Arts of Japan Gallery at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston

The new, permanent Arts of Japan Gallery at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, will open to the public on Sunday, February 19. The Japan gallery will be the final installation in a suite of permanent Arts of Asia galleries surrounding Cullinan Hall in the Caroline Wiess Law Building, culminating an effort begun in 2007 to expand the presentation of Asian art at the museum.
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5 Great Interviews with Chanoyu (Tea Ceremony) Practitioners

Blake Harvey — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 05:22:09 +0000

I recently found a very nice blog “Tea and Travel” written by Deborah Huff. Over the past couple of months, she has interviewed 5 practitioners of Japanese tea ceremony. I always appreciate reading how people first became interested in chanoyu and the unique perspectives they have on the different facets of studying Tea. Below are links to all 5 interviews. Be sure to read them all!

Part 5: Interview with Drew Hanson – Drew is an Urasenke instructor in the Philadelphia area and has studied Chado for over 15 years.

Part 4: Interview with Michael Ricci – Michael is an Urasenke instructor in Boulder and Fort Collins Colorado area.

Part 3: Interview with Gabriel Cacilua – Gabriel is an Urasenke instructor in Brussels, Belgium and has studied Chado for over 20 years.

Part 2: Interview with Morgan Beard – Morgan is an Urasenke instructor who lectures and performs demostrations in the Philadelphia area.

Part 1: Interview with Rebecca Lynn Craig – Rebecca is a student of Omote-Senke and owner of a tea shop in Ottawa, Canada.

Teaching Tea in Japan

Blake Harvey — Tue, 05 Oct 2010 05:21:35 +0000

Arriving in Japan three decades ago wasn’t easy for Søren M. Chr. Bisgaard, a Danish-born master of the Urasenke school of the tea ceremony. Even though he had already travelled to 30 countries – including many parts of Asia – he found Japan to be a different type of brew.

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Practicing the Way of Tea

Blake Harvey — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 04:44:37 +0000

Mikael Zaurov of www.teamuse.com has written a wonderful article on the philosophical and symbolic attitudes that accompany Japanese Tea Ceremony. While he never addresses Tea Ceremony explicitly, many of the ideas he presents lead straight to the essence of practicing Tea Ceremony. He begins with an insightful Buddhist koan by Zhao Zhou and finishes by telling us how drinking a bowl of tea can influence and change our daily life.

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Contemporary ceramics update the tea ceremony

Blake Harvey — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 05:42:53 +0000

Within the tea world there are stunning gardens, contemplative tea rooms, seasonal flowers, delicious foods, and varied tea vessels made of bamboo, lacquer, glass and most often clay. It’s the latter material that is the most varied and used in the Way of Tea throughout its long history. How contemporary ceramic artists are adapting their tea wares to the present day is the theme of a remarkable exhibition now showing at the Musee Tomo, Tokyo, and titled “The Musee Tomo Prize, Contemporary Ceramics for the Tea Ceremony: Free Creativity and Atypical Usage.”

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Lu Yu and the purity of tea

Blake Harvey — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 19:00:30 +0000

Lu Yu, a Tang Dynasty figure whose authorship of the Cha Ching (the Classic of Tea) has earned him the status as the “god” of tea, is a fascinating figure who has given us an historical insight into the growing, manufacture and brewing of tea.

At his tea blog, Loose Leaf, Alex Fraser has a short, but thought provoking article on the mixing of tea with different flavourings.

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Tea Gathering at San Francisco’s Urasenke Society

Blake Harvey — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 18:51:43 +0000

Christie Bartlett, Founding Director of Ursaenke Society, San Francisco talks about the history of Urasenke, why tea gatherings matter today, and the ripple effect of “peace through a bowl of tea.”

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Artisans hand down tea-whisk tradition

Blake Harvey — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 03:36:11 +0000

This year marks the 1,300th anniversary of the relocation of the capital to present-day Nara, then called Heijokyo. And while tourists may flock to anniversary events, temples and shrines renovated for the occasion and to special public viewings of Buddhist statues and treasures, Nara has another treasure to be proud of. It is Takayama chasen, tea whisks used in traditional tea ceremonies. Read full article

Tea and Chinese Cultural Aesthetics

Blake Harvey — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 05:38:04 +0000

Pei-kai Cheng, founding director and professor of the Chinese Civilisation Centre at the City University of Hong Kong and author of the recent two-volume publication, The Complete Annotated Collection of Chinese Tea Books, explores the cultural significance of tea drinking during the Tang period (618–907 CE). Cheng discusses the change and continuity of “The Way of Tea” (chado) from the Tang-Song period to the Ming-Qing period, revealing the cultural diversity of the tea-drinking ceremony as influenced by various social entities and institutions and by agronomical and technological advances. This talk also examines how aesthetic appreciation and choice of wares for tea ceremony influenced the development of Chinese porcelain-making technology. Listen to Podcast

Our ugly beautiful world

Blake Harvey — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 12:00:49 +0000

A scene of the Chapter "SEKI YA"(Gate Hut) of Illustrated handscroll of Tale of Genji (written by MURASAKI SHIKIBU).

BY AMIN GHADIMI – We live in a beautiful world. Or do we? Every day the evidence to the contrary seems to mount, and to make such a sweeping claim in the face of so much national and global adversity feels fatuous, even callous and perhaps cruel. But “everyone recognizes beauty / only because of ugliness,” claims the second verse of Jonathan Star’s translation of the Tao Te Ching. Perhaps we can sift through our ugly world and, despite ourselves, despite everything, winnow out all the dross that defiles it. Read full article