Kintsugi: A Timeless Art for a Fractured World
How the Ancient Practice of Kintsugi Repair Offers a Moral Compass for Our Times
By Morty Bachar, ceramic artist, art restorer, and founder of Lakeside Pottery Studio | April 10, 2025
In an era where division, cruelty, and indifference often dominate the headlines, the ancient Japanese art of Kintsugi, repairing broken pottery with gold, offers a powerful metaphor for healing. At a time when our government feels morally fractured and society increasingly fragmented, Kintsugi’s philosophy of restoration, resilience, and reverence for imperfection stands in quiet defiance.
As a ceramic and Kintsugi artist, I’ve come to see this practice not just as a method of repair, but as a worldview, one that honors brokenness, sees potential in damage, and insists on empathy in an age that too often celebrates disposability and suppresses opposition.
The Urgency of Kintsugi in a Fractured World
With nearly two decades of experience and thousands of Kintsugi restorations created for individuals and institutions, I’ve been entrusted with more than broken objects - I’ve been invited into stories. Stories of loss, perseverance, love, and memory. Each repair carries the silent testimony of courage, grief, and the human instinct to heal. These encounters have shaped not only my understanding of the craft but of the deeper reasons why people seek restoration: not merely to fix what was broken, but to give form to resilience, to make visible the invisible work of transformation.
In a world splintered by war, climate upheaval, social unrest, and personal hardship, the ancient Japanese art of Kintsugi offers more than repair, it offers a way forward. Once a quiet technique, it has become a philosophy, a moral stance, a quiet rebellion against a culture that discards what it deems broken.
Kintsugi teaches us to honor damage, not hide it but see beauty in resilience and strength in imperfection. In these fractured times, it’s not just relevant; it’s essential. It speaks a language the world urgently needs to hear.
What Is Kintsugi?
Kintsugi, meaning "golden joinery," is the centuries-old technique of mending broken pottery with lacquer and gold. Rather than hiding the cracks, it highlights them, telling the story of the object’s breakage and resilience with beauty and reverence. Each piece becomes unique, not despite its flaws, but because of them.
Why Kintsugi Matters More Than Ever?
We’re conditioned to hide our wounds and present a flawless front. In a world that prizes perfection and disposability, broken things, whether objects, relationships, or communities, are often cast aside. But Kintsugi offers a powerful alternative: it asks us to honor the breakage, to mend what’s broken with care, and to recognize the beauty in its transformation.
As a ceramic artist and restorer, I see Kintsugi as more than a technique. It’s a philosophy of healing, both personal and collective. When I hold a broken vessel, I don’t just see fragments. I see a life interrupted, a story marked by rupture and the possibility of renewal.
From Craft to Calling
Lakeside Pottery Studio began with a simple love for form, glaze, and function. In the early days, we focused on creating wheel-thrown bowls, vases, and the subtle beauty of handcrafted ceramics. But over time, our work evolved, shifting toward something quieter, more intimate: the art of restoring what others might throw away.
Today, much of the studio’s soul lives in the gold seams of Kintsugi whether we’re repairing a beloved family heirloom or bringing a shattered sculptural figure back to life. My own journey has deepened this connection.
As a humanist, I believe in the dignity and moral potential of every person. Kintsugi speaks directly to those values. It honors our fragility, reminds us of the power of compassion, and reveals the strength that comes from choosing care over indifference, and restoration over abandonment.
Kintsugi as a Form of Resistance
To practice Kintsugi today is to resist a culture obsessed with perfection, allergic to vulnerability, and quick to discard what no longer serves. It’s an act of quiet rebellion against systems that marginalize the different, the damaged, and the inconvenient. In a world that rewards appearances and punishes authenticity, Kintsugi dares to say: what is broken still belongs.
It’s not just repair, it’s refusal. Refusal to accept that brokenness is failure. Refusal to believe that cracks must be hidden. In today’s cruel political landscape where lies are currency, dissent is silenced, and justice is no longer blind, Kintsugi speaks with quiet, golden authority.
It says:
You are not defined by what broke you.
You are shaped by how you choose to heal.
Each piece repaired in our studio is a protest against despair, a luminous act of hope in the face of indifference. It stands in direct opposition to a world that has become disposable, deceptive, and detached.
Kintsugi insists on empathy.
It honors truth.
It elevates imperfection.
And in doing so, it reclaims something sacred:
the dignity of the human story, fractures and all.
A Thread Across Faiths
For those who follow an origin-based religion, whether it be Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, or others, the philosophy behind Kintsugi echoes the spiritual call at the heart of all sacred teachings: to embrace humility, to seek wholeness, to repair what has been broken.
The Hebrew concept of Tikkun Olam, the Christian practice of grace and redemption, the Islamic principle of mercy and renewal, and the Buddhist embrace of suffering as a path to enlightenment all point toward a shared moral compass. They ask believers not to discard the broken but to heal with compassion, see beauty in imperfection, and transform wounds into wisdom.
Kintsugi, though rooted in Japanese culture, offers a spiritual metaphor that transcends borders. It reminds us that healing is holy work and that restoration of self, of society, of our shared humanity, is sacred.
Repairing the Fractures of a Broken Society
The erosion of social programs, the denial of climate realities, and the neglect of the vulnerable are not isolated failures—they are symptoms of a deeper moral collapse. These choices abandon the core values of empathy, justice, and shared responsibility. They reflect a culture that, like a shattered vessel, has forgotten how to hold what matters most.
From the marginalization of LGBTQ+ and transgender individuals to the silencing of diverse voices through book bans and the persistence of racial inequity, we are witnessing the deliberate deepening of societal cracks. Those already at the margins are being pushed further out discarded by systems meant to protect, and erased by policies that reward only the unbroken.
Kintsugi teaches us that brokenness is not the end of the story, it is the beginning of transformation. We must adopt this ethic not only in art but in how we govern, care, and coexist. To restore our collective humanity, we must reject the obsession with perfection and power. We must choose repair over abandonment, equity over exclusion.
This is not just a political imperative, it is a moral one. Just as a pot mended with gold becomes more beautiful and resilient, so too can a society that dares to honor its wounds and commit to healing.
What Can We Do?
No action is too small when done with compassion. Each of us has the power to contribute to repair:
- Support organizations that provide trauma care, mental health services, and legal aid to those most affected by injustice
- Donate and volunteer our time and resources where they are most needed
- Amplify voices too often silenced
- Influence religious leaders and organizations to uphold the moral heart of their teachings, compassion, justice, and the dignity of all people
- Listen with openness and humility
- Show up physically, emotionally, and consistently
- Educate ourselves and others on histories, systems, and truths often overlooked
- Vote with intention
- Write to our representatives and demand justice
- Stand with the marginalized in both word and deed
These are all acts of repair every one of them a step toward healing the world and affirming our shared humanity.
A Path Forward
Whether it’s a bowl broken by accident, a sculpture cracked by time, or a world broken by greed and hate, Kintsugi reminds us that all things can be mended and not just mended but made more beautiful and stronger. This is not merely restoration. It is transformation.
It’s why I still feel a surge of reverence when I apply gold into the cobalt blue fractures of a crystalline vessel. That moment, for me, holds the weight of everything I believe:
- That truth matters.
- That kindness matters,
- That we are never beyond repair
We must be free to be who we want or are meant to be, embraced for our differences, and free to express ourselves so long as our voices do no harm to anyone or anything. In this space of respect and healing, Kintsugi becomes more than art; it becomes a way of life.
“There is a crack in everything. That’s how the light gets in" - Leonard Cohen
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