Satsuma ware

By adapting their gilded polychromatic enamel overglaze designs to appeal to the tastes of western consumers, manufacturers of the latter made Satsuma ware one of the most recognized and profitable export products of Japan for centuries, and even became one of the key sources of funding for the Meiji period reforms.

[5] Of the Korean potters settled in Japan which revolutionized Japanese pottery, members of the well known Shim (심 沈) clan, who is now headed by the 15th generation Shim Su-gwan (Chin Jukan, 심수관, 沈壽官), have continued to make the Chin Jukan-brand pottery to this day, making sales offline and online, while keeping his ancestral identity by holding Korean ceremonies in traditional Joseon attire, and have attempted to improve Korean-Japanese relations by speaking in public and holding exhibits.

[8] Prior to 1790, pieces were not ornately decorated, but rather humble articles of folk-ware intended for practical everyday use in largely rustic environments or the tea ceremony.

Given that they were "largely destined for use in gloomy farmhouse kitchens", potters often relied on tactile techniques such as raised relief, stamp impressions and clay carving to give pieces interest.

[11] From around 1800, brocade (錦手, nishikide) painted decoration began to flourish, including a palette of "delicate iron-red, a glossy blue, a bluish green, a soft purple black, and a yellow very sparingly used".

[14] The designs—often light, simple floral patterns—were highly influenced by both Kyoto pottery and the Kanō school of painting, resulting in an emphasis on negative space.

[16] The first major presentation of Japanese arts and culture to the West was at Paris' Exposition Universelle in 1867, and Satsuma ware figured prominently among the items displayed.

[30] The mid-1880s saw the beginning of an export slump for many Japanese goods, including Satsuma ware, linked in part to a depreciation of quality and novelty through mass production.

It was negatively received at Chicago's Columbian Exposition of 1893, but remained a popular export commodity into the twentieth century, becoming "virtually synonymous with Japanese ceramics" throughout the Meiji period.

According to art historian Gisela Jahn, "in no other style of ceramics did the Japanese go to such extremes in attempting to appeal to Western tastes, and nowhere else were the detrimental effects of mass production more clearly evident".

[34] Serious foreign collectors also turned their backs on export works as "crude, chalky pâte, covered with coarsely fissured glaze, in which more often than otherwise an excess of feldspar has produced discoloured deposits that suggest the reverse of technical skill.

Early in the twentieth century these artists also began to incorporate western techniques and styles, including perspective and muted colours,[43] as well as the use of liquid gold (水金, suikin), which was originally developed by Germany's Meissen.

[49] The incredible popularity of Satsuma ware and the eagerness of collectors to find pre-Meiji pieces led some manufacturers and dealers to deliberately misrepresent items' age and origins.