Background
Shin Shioda was born in 1837 in Tokyo, Japan. His family served the Tsushima Clan as physicians for generations.
脛 塩田
Shin Shioda was born in 1837 in Tokyo, Japan. His family served the Tsushima Clan as physicians for generations.
Shin Shioda went to the Vienna international exposition with Sukejiro Notomi (1873). He was sent to the Philadelphia exposition (1876). While there, wrote a history of Japanese pottery which served as an explanatory for a collection of ancient Japanese ceramics at the South Kensington Museum in London. It was published in a book form under the title, "Japanese Pottery."
After returning to Japan, he and Notomi opened a pottery at Koishikawa, Tokyo, with Shioda as director. It was equipped with a flat kiln of the Notomi style, which was a forerunner of the Wagner type. Wagner's Asahi-yaki pottery was first made there on an experimental basis.
He is also credited with having induced Kozan Miyakawa, a talented potter, to abandon producing the vulgar type of chinaware that suited the taste of foreigners to concentrate on creating elegant, artistic works of traditional style.
He was a leader of industrial designers and, as a secretary of the Agriculture and Commerce Ministry, was chiefly responsible for the establishment of its commercial museum. He also established a commercial museum in Tientsin, North China.
He traveled abroad four times and contributed much to the promotion of Japanese arts and crafts.