This single Tea-bowl is considered to be the finest in the world. . . . to contain the essence of Tea. . . .

In 1931 I was shown this bowl in company with my friend, the potter Kanjiro Kawai. For a long time I had wished to see this Kizaemon bowl. I had expected to see that “essence of Tea,” the seeing eye of Tea masters, and to test my own perception; for it is the embodiment in miniature of beauty, of the love of beauty, of the philosophy of beauty, and of the relationship of beauty and life. It was within box after box, five deep, buried in wool and wrapped in purple silk.

When I saw it, my heart fell. A good Tea-bowl, yes, but how ordinary! So simple, no more ordinary thing could be imagined. There is not a trace of ornament, not a trace of calculation. It is just a Korean food bowl . . . that a poor man would use everyday. . . .

A typical thing for his use; costing next to nothing . . . an article without the flavour of personality; used carelessly by its owner; bought without pride; something anyone could have bought anywhere and everywhere. . . . The kiln was a wretched affair; the firing careless. Sand had stuck to the pot, but nobody minded; no one invested the thing with any dreams. It is enough to make one give up working as a potter. . . .

But that was as it should be. The plain and unagitated, the uncalculated, the harmless, the straightforward, the natural, the innocent, the humble, the modest: where does beauty lie if not in these qualities? The meek, the austere, the unornate—they are the natural characteristics that gain man’s affection and respect.

More than anything else, this pot is healthy. Made for a purpose, made to do work. Sold to be used in everyday life. . . . Only a commonplace practicality can guarantee health in something made. . . .

Emerging from a squalid kitchen, the Ido bowl took its seat on the highest throne of beauty. The Koreans laughed. That was to be expected, but both laughter and praise are right, for had they not laughed they would not have been the people who could have made such bowls . . . The Koreans made rice bowls; the Japanese masters made them into Tea-bowls. . . .

In this important proto-Duchampian event we may observe the construction of meaning at a most unique and informative moment. The Kizaemon Tea-bowl’s meaning was “discovered.” And this discovery was imposed suddenly upon an existing object that was previously understood to be something completely different—an ordinary food bowl.

How is this different from the construction of meaning in painting where qualities are “fabricated” for new objects? When we paint, we build qualities with our paint which we already know or suspect will have currency in the realm of painting. From our private and collective notions of significant painting, we construct objects which will conform to or embody these notions. In the case of the Tea bowl, an object is reframed, reinvented, and reclassified by virtue of its new context, its new function, and its place in a new story. From Korean kitchen to the rarified realm of the Tea Ceremony, entirely different narratives envelop the Kizaemon bowl, and it is these framing narratives that construct it, not clay.