An impulse that reaches all the way down to the clay
Nakajima's work begins long before anything takes shape — with a powerful attachment to the earth under his feet.
Driving a mountain road on a trip, he'll find his eyes pulled toward the ripples of an exposed rock face; spotting a construction site, he'll stop the car and go over to put his hands directly into the soil. He can feel through his skin that a clay is high in iron, and he has been known to contact a landowner himself just to get hold of a particular earth. All of it comes down to one thing: he is helplessly drawn to the uncertain character of clay, which never reveals its true face until it has been fired.
Rather than simply tidying a vessel into something pretty, the question for him is how to draw out the individuality of a clay — no two of them alike. That pure curiosity about the material is the origin of everything he makes.
Where he draws the line as a professional
Behind his usual gentle way of speaking is a quiet strictness that allows no compromise in what he releases into the world.
What he dislikes most is a wobble — the faintest rattle of a piece against the table. If glaze melted by the heat has pooled at the foot and unsettles the way a vessel stands, it doesn't count as finished work, however good its surface may look.
Clay and glaze pull against each other through a punishing firing that can warp a piece out of true. Only what passes through that unforgiving filter is sent out to you with Nakajima's name on it.
"The lines are a document of who I was in that moment"
Those striking lines running across the surface of his vessels aren't decoration. They work more like a mirror, showing him back to himself as he was at that moment.
When his mind is running high and he is full of energy, the lines dance out boldly, without hesitation. When he can't quite find confidence in himself, or feels on edge, thin and delicate lines gather carefully over one another. Because that once-and-never-again state of mind is cut into the clay, every one of his pieces is finished as living evidence of a moment that can't be drawn twice.
He wants whoever picks one up to feel the maker breathing alongside them, then and there. For him, that is precisely what it means to make things as an artist rather than a manufacturer.
The final brushstroke belongs to the person who uses it
Nakajima doesn't consider a vessel complete the moment it ships. The areas he deliberately leaves unglazed, with the clay bare, take in moisture and oil every time food is served and hands touch the surface, and their expression deepens as they do. A rough texture that can feel a little standoffish at first will, if you use it hard — the way you'd season a wok — and let the traces of daily life soak in, grow into a smooth and quietly lustrous beauty.
The same is true of his guinomi sake cups, whose thin rims he cares about deeply as a drinker himself. The more sake soaks into them, the further they develop, until they've become part of the life of whoever drinks from them.
Making "Nakajima" a mark you recognise at a glance
In the studio he works alone with the clay, with B'z or Fujii Kaze playing, or a favourite drama he has already rewatched more times than he'd admit.
Ceramics was once an extension of play. After training at a pottery, it turned into a commitment he intends to keep for the rest of his life. Vessels, sculptural objects — he doesn't want to be bound by any one technique, but he does want to establish a mark that tells you at a glance: this is a Nakajima. With that free, direct ambition, he goes on pressing his own heat into the clay today.
From muny: a note for you
Nakajima's vessels will keep moving toward completion in your hands, over years. Look for the maker's breath in the waver of a line drawn according to the mood of one particular day. And then — why not raise this clay freely, at your own table?
