Founder of Kutani ware in Kaga (Ishikawa Prefecture). He was the younger brother of Ichienemon, the eighth generation of the famous Goto family of Japanese goldsmiths. He was the great-grandson of Ichiemon, the younger brother of Kenjo Goto, the eighth generation of the famous Goto family of goldsmiths in Japan, and his grandfather-in-law, Saijiro Yoshisada, served Maeda Toshiharu, lord of the Daishojiji domain, and was given a fief of 150 koku (about $100) for his services as a Ginza (Ginza) official. Tadakiyo was particularly skilled in the art of metal carving and was also said to have been an expert at carving Buddhist statues.
There used to be a gold mine in Kutani Village, Enuma County (Yamanaka-cho, Kutani-machi), and its mouth reached more than 40 places. Tadakiyo had been living there with his father, Saijiro Sadatsugu, since he was a young man, and was always familiar with the furnace, which was used to blow gold and silver. In 1659, when Tadakiyo was 26 years old, he went to Hizen (Saga and Nagasaki prefectures) to learn the art of porcelain making on behalf of his father. He happened to visit Nagasaki, where he met several exiled potters from the Ming Dynasty in China, and accompanied them back to his domain at the beginning of the Kanbun period (1661-73), where they built a kiln in the former Kutani Village and produced Ming-style five-color porcelain. This is the type of painted porcelain known as Ko-Kutani in later times. In other words, Chusei was not a potter, but a Chinese potter whom he used as a direct craftsman. He died on March 24, 1704, at the age of 71. The above is based on “History of Kutani Ceramics” by Sataro Matsumoto, but there are many different theories about Saijiro Goto.
