Miyagi: Famous ink-stones of Ishinomaki
For traditional Japanese calligraphy, a suzuri (or an ink stone in English) is one of the most important elements, which is used for blending sumi ink with water. All Japanese children take traditional Japanese calligraphy classes.
Ishinomaki city, Miyagi holds nationally famous Ogatsu suzuri makers. They, too, ware affected by the disaster of 3.11 last year. Their factory received much damage from the tsunami, and haven’t been able to produce new ink stones as of today.
To keep the Ogatsu suzuri tradition going, the makers union has started selling the restored ink stones which were recovered from the debris at a temporary shopping strip in the city. After three apprentice suzuri craftsmen in their 20s sanding and polishing them to remove scratches, master craftsmen finish them with sumi-ink. They were able to restore 3,000 ink stones with minor scratches and sell them for 20% off the regular price.
One of the apprentices said that he put his heart into polishing them as he values the tradition. He also said that he was glad to take on this job because he can see how well the ink stones were made by his elders.
The union plans to rebuild the factory to start making new ink stones.
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