Tosen Iwasaki: The Sense of Wonder Ⅷー A Straight Line 15.10.2022-8.1.2023

About the exhibition

Tosen Iwasaki’s calligraphy resembles a jumble of lines concentrated in one area. This is due to the artist’s desire to connect straight lines that continue endlessly.

Her words stand out clearly. One could say that each work is a poem.

One poem, one form.

Her straight line works are reminiscent of Piet Mondrian, but instead of the line continuing into infinity, the artist has blown an end to it with a straw. The line appears endlessly long, but ultimately it is scattered to the heavens together with the meaning contained in the poem.

Yamamoto Hisashi
shodō artist, contemporary artist and curator of this exhibition

This is a mini exhibition comprising about ten works, that are exhibited on the second floor of the home museum and in the museum cafeteria. The exhibition is realized in collaboration with the Japanese Embassy.
NB! The second floor of the home museum can be accessed only by stairs, and is therefore not easily accessible. The exhibition is open according to the museum's opening hours, Wed, Sat, Sun 12-17. Admission: 12/10 €, the Museum Card, under 18-year-old 0 €.

Artist presentation

Shodō (calligraphy) came to Japan from China and was then further developed. Like others, I too began my career at a calligraphy school, where I learned the basics of shodō by copying ancient texts. Without noticing it, I went from thinking “I want to write beautiful letters” to thinking “I want to write letters only I can write”. So I started writing my own poems and the characters used in them in my own style, which deviates from the traditional style.

If I were to pick one expression to describe the feeling that my calligraphy evokes, it would be The Sense of Wonder, which is also the theme of my exhibition. It is also the title of the book by Rachel Carson, who has described the expression as “the sense to look at mystery and wonder”.

In order to convey this feeling and find new forms of expression, I got acquainted a few years ago with the ART SHODO movement. Nowadays, together with my colleagues, we encourage each other to develop and practice shodō calligraphy specifically as art and not as traditional culture.

A special feature of calligraphy is the impossibility of correcting the strokes of the brush; the use of ink leads to random results. I want to express my thoughts as one poem, one form in accordance with the conceptual artform of word art.

Tosen Iwasaki
shodō calligraphist

Picture: Tosen Iwasaki, Absolute Zero. Photo: Tosen Iwasaki