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| | What is Japanes Lacquer? |
 | | They were fascinated with lacquer, which was unknown in the West, and they tried to describe it for their compatriots back home. |
 | | Rodrigues was describing a common lacquer technique in which metal particles, usually gold or silver, are sprinkled onto still damp lacquer to create an image or pattern; the lacquer acts as an adhesive to the metal particles, and when it has hardened, the two mediums together create a lustrous, adamantine picture. |
 | | These lacquer pictures were used on all sorts of objects-- boxes to hold one's personal belongings, containers for sacred Buddhist sutras, even entire buildings-- and they made utilitarian things into precious objects. |
| faculty.vassar.edu /anwatsky/art358/lacquer.html (298 words) |
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