SAGA (Kyodo) An exhibition showcasing over 100 items of locally made porcelain and Dutch earthenware will open Wednesday to commemorate 400 years of ties between Japan and the Netherlands, event organizers said Monday.
The exhibition will run for two months until June 26 at the Arita Porcelain Park in Arita, Saga Prefecture, and traces the cultural exchanges between the two countries through the pottery trade, the organizers said.
Among the 115 items on display will be Dutch pottery patterned after Arita pottery, and Arita earthenware from the Edo Period (1603-1868), they said.
Arita earthenware dating from the second decade of the 17th century was exported from Dejima, Nagasaki, to Europe in large quantities from the 1650s onward by Holland's Vereenighde Oostindische Compagnie. Dejima was the only place foreigners were allowed to live in Japan at the time.
Potters in Arita then started polishing up their chinaware-styled items and creating several other earthenware items , such as coffee pots, for the European market.
The Netherlands in the 18th century, greatly influenced by Arita pottery, became a pioneer of porcelain production in Europe, according to the organizers.
Japanese-Dutch ties effectively began on April 19, 1600, when the Dutch merchant vessel De Liefde ran ashore on the coast of what is now the town of Usuki in Oita Prefecture.
The ship's pilot, Englishman William Adams, was given an audience with future shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu (1542-1616), who expressed interest in trading with the Netherlands.
The Dutch were subsequently allowed to establish a trading house on Dejima, an artificial island specially built by the shogunate for the purpose.
The park is open from 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. but closed on Tuesdays.