When I was a child, early spring when white plums become ready to bloomwas
so exciting as horsetails, sign of spring, were about to pop up.
I dreamed of the sign, sneaked up the banks of the Yodo River nearby by
pushbikeand scanned the ground which was still sepia in the cold airthat
froze my cheeks and hands.
I picked up the horsetails into a basket that my father gave meand celebrated their birth.
I loved that moment and I still do after half a century.
The season shifts to spring after the traditional ceremony of taking sacred
water at Todaiji Temple in Nara around mid March.
Then we enjoy various kinds of wild flower such as dandelion, dayflower
and cuckooflower during summer,and boneset and others in autumn. |
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I cherished the modest wild flowers as if they were my children and started making Washi paper weaving them intoto give them eternal life.
The woods and fields that brought me wild flowers also gave me nuts from
the trees.
Chestnut was a treasure as it tasted sweet when roasted and dyed my fingers
in pale pink when boiled.
My mother and I dyed Washi paper and silk with this pigment and developed this work into painting with tannin pigment.
These arts kept attracting me for half a century being my lifework today.
And my devotion and enthusiasm have never been changed. |
