I live and work in the Oribe tradition and in the traditional area of old Oribe, but I rebel against my strict training in traditional ceramics.

Plovers, chidori, symbolic of endurance and survival against the odds, are quickly sketched out in iron glaze. They swoop between crashing waves of thick, green copper glaze. It is an early work by this acclaimed ceramicist, working in the traditional 16th-century oribe style of Mino stoneware.

Credited with reviving the Momoyama-period artform and bringing it into the modern era, Suzuki's career has been marked by regular exhibitions and awards for an increasingly avant-garde output, receiving the prestigious Japan Ceramic Society Prize in 2002.

Born in Toyota City in Aichi Prefecture, and now working out of Fujioka in the Seto area, works by him are widely held in both western and Japanese museum collections, including the Metropolitan in New York, Minneapolis Institute of Art, LACMA and the MFA, Boston.