Mingei (民藝, "folk crafts") was a movement founded by Yanagi Sōetsu in 1920s Japan to recover and valorize the everyday objects made by anonymous craftspeople.
Yanagi's argument: beauty is most fully expressed in objects made with skill and care for practical use, without self-conscious aestheticism. The tea bowl used daily by a farmer is more beautiful than the tea bowl made for an emperor's collection.
The movement influenced studio pottery (Bernard Leach), architecture (Bruno Taut), and design (MUJI's founders drew on mingei principles). It also carries a tension: once "folk craft" is valorized by intellectuals and sold in museums, is it still folk craft?