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Japanese Lacquer
Raw lacquer is the sap of the Rhus
verniciflua tree, of which a high-quality strain is found in
Japan. Lacquer has been used to coat objects, initially for
preservation and later for decoration, for about fifteen hundred
years. The lacquer process is complex. Each layer of lacquer must
be applied, cured in a humidor to achieve polymerization
(hardening), and then polished before the process can be repeated
with the next layer. The difficulty is enhanced by the toxic
nature of lacquer, which is related to poison sumac.
In the case of maki-e (gold
lacquer), designs are created with variously sized tiny gold
flecks skillfully applied; the gold is sprinkled out of a tube
with a screen over its end to create a design in the uppermost
layers of the lacquer. A translucent layer of lacquer is then
brushed over the gold-sprinkled layer and polished down after
hardening to reveal the decoration.
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