北大路魯山人

Rosanjin (1883–1959) was a virtuoso of Japanese aesthetics who mastered an extraordinary range of disciplines—calligraphy, ceramics, seal carving, painting, lacquerwork, and cooking. Born in Kyoto, he was orphaned young and apprenticed to a woodblock carver, but taught himself through voracious study of classical art and antiquities. In the 1920s, after moving to Tokyo and establishing a members' restaurant, Rosanjin began creating pottery to replace a collection lost in the 1923 earthquake.