Kamakura has of course a Kamakura Bori Museum: Kamakura Bori Kaikan. It is situated in the middle of the city on the main street on the way to the Tsurugaoka Hachimangu Shrine, Kamakura’s most important shrine, which was founded by Monamoto Yoriyoshi in 1063, and enlarged ... Continue Reading
When Kamakura was the seat of power for the ruling Shogunate in around 1200AD, monk sculptors copied the technique of carving and lacquering wood imported from China into Buddhist images. This way grew and developed into the art of Kamakura Bori.* The first feature is the techni ... Continue Reading
I live in Kamakura (one hour south of Tokyo) and feel very fortunate. It is the ancient capital of the first shogun, Minamoto yo Yoritomo, of the 12th and 13th century, known as the Kamakura Period (1192-1333). A Shogun, “Commander in Chief”, is the military ran ... Continue Reading
We stayed at the Nan-in, the center temple of all festivities: meetings, eating, sleeping and performing art events. The Buddhist service started every morning at 6.30am and after that we had breakfast. At 9am we had a staff meeting. Ayako-san and Shinobu-san , the founders of Ha ... Continue Reading
On Monday, we went with Takeshi-san from the International Coffeehouse and where I had lunch almost everyday,to Amano, a village on Koyasan which existed already before Kukai (Kobo Daishi) started his Buddhist monastic complex at Koyasan. Takeshi-san wanted Eriko-san, who is a ph ... Continue Reading
Happy maker is an art festival in which works of different genres can be experienced while walking around Koya town. Many events have been organized for both adults and children. It’s exhibition space is Mount Koya which has a long history of artists. Beautiful art on folding s ... Continue Reading
In 2 weeks I will have an exhibition at mount Koyasan with 40 other artist. It will be a multi media exhibition and I will have my show in the Eko-in temple. I’m preparing and packing. We will travel for 6 hours and transfer several times on different trains to reach Koyasa ... Continue Reading
The “zaimoku” in the name Zaimokuza means “lumber,” and the “za” generally means a guild of merchants and artisans who did business under the patronage of the large shrines, and temples in the Kamakura (1185/92-1333) and Muromachi periods (1335 ... Continue Reading
I’m back again in Japan. I have been in the USA for the graduation of my oldest son from UCSD and youngest son from USC and in The Netherlands for the celebration of my mother-in-law’s 80th birthday and for visiting and being with my middle son. I got a very bad cold ... Continue Reading
It is evening and I hear the frogs croak really loud like a whole orchestra! I arrived here in Miharu, Fukushima last Tuesday to work, throw some pots, at Kusakabe-san’s place and fire a kiln. Miharu means “Three spring”: the first 3 blossoms in spring are: plum ... Continue Reading
