Clog-Shaped Tea Bowl (Chawan) with Plum Blossoms and Geometric Patterns early 17th century Japan Tea bowls in the Oribe style were often shaped something like ancient clogs and described as kutsugata, or "clog-shaped." After a round tea bowl had been formed on the wheel, it was indented in several places, destroying the circular shape and producing an asymmetrical form. The exterior surface of the bowl was then worked with a spatula to make it rough and uneven. Flamboyant distortions and irregularities of this type characterize the aesthetics of Oribe ware.This tea bowl's vital, organic-seeming form is paired with vigorous surface design. The rich iron-black glaze that covers most of the bowl frames the patterns in the white areas. Inside the bowl, each diamond-shaped compartment of the grid is filled with either the representational depiction of a flower or a stylized motif resembling a plum blossom (five dots encircling a sixth). On the exterior, various geometric patterns are boldly