Nakatomi Hajime
(b. 1974)
Nakatomi attended one of Japan's top private colleges, the American
equivalent of Harvard or Yale. He was a member of the university ceramics
club and was a serious student of clay until several events conspired to
change the course of his career. He saw a bamboo sculpture made by Shono
Shounsai, met the bamboo artist and industrial designer Ohashi in Tokyo,
and came upon a book about bamboo fences. The beauty and versatility of
bamboo left him awe-struck and, much to his parents' dismay, he decided to
attend the Beppu Occupational School to learn bamboo. He later apprenticed
to Honda Syoryu.
Nakatomi's interest is in quiet, delicate vessels that straddle the line
between traditional and contemporary styles. A student of Sencha tea
ceremony, his work has twice garnered the Oita Governor's Prize and, in
2004, the Beppu Mayor's Prize at the 40th Beppu City Bamboo New Works
Exhibition. Nakatomi has only recently begun to exhibit at the national
level in Japan.
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