So often we in America conceive of the world as a series of bilateral relationships, but life abroad is simply broader. Exploring and appreciating a wider and more complex variety of international relations is one of the small joys of that broader world, and I suppose my Irish-American blood gets a particular trill from encountering the Irish-Japanese community.

Moya Bligh, a good friend from the women artists’ group in my last post, is a printmaker and woodblock artist from Kilkenny, Ireland. She came to Japan some 35 years ago on a Japanese government scholarship to study art and has lived here ever since. Now an art professor at Seika University, Moya recently curated a print exhibition, idir/aida – a celebration of Ireland in Japan at Artislong (life is short), a gallery here on the west side of Kyoto. The show marked the 50th anniversary of diplomatic relations between the two countries and featured five printmakers, three Irish and two Japanese, who had each studied and worked in the other’s country. The works reflected each artist’s interpretation of the cross-cultural influences in their shared experiences.

As delightful as the show has been, it is not an isolated phenomenon. Artists and writers from Ireland and Japan have been finding inspiration in each other’s culture for quite some time. In the late 1800s, Lafcadio Hearn, an Irish writer who became fascinated with Japan, translated and popularized Japanese ghost stories in the west and his books have continued in print for over a century. Contemporary Irish writers have continued the tradition with no lesser degree of fascination.

And the reverse is also true, I have several Japanese friends who regale me with stories of their lives in Dublin as we sit in one of the several Irish pubs that dot the cityscape of old Kyoto.

Added on January 29, 2009:
Much to my grief, my good friend Moya Bligh died yesterday, January 28, 2009, after a brief illness due to injuries sustained in a bicycling accident two weeks earlier. I am told that her passing was peaceful. The loss of Moya’s sweet spirit is grieved by very many, yet she will continue to live on in the hearts and minds of all who were blessed to know her.

Facing a new life in a new culture with a new language can be daunting at times, even for the most adventurous. I often hear friends in America complain about immigrants not learning English and I’m certainly aware of Japanese who suspiciously grumble, “Nihon ni nihongo de hanashimasu!” (In Japan, speak in Japanese!) But the truth is, there is such a comfort in speaking your mother tongue in a strange land.

Being a city of considerable size, Kyoto has several foreign language communities — Chinese, Spanish and English to name a few. And I happily play within the latter. Of course, there are a variety of circles and subsets in any community and three of my favorites are “Women’s Network”, a monthly potluck of English-speaking women; “Asian Studies Group”, English-speaking scholars of Asian history, arts and humanities; and “Women Artists’ Association”, a grouping of foreign women artists from a wide range of countries and continents.

The artists’ group (pictured to the right at a recent outing to a Turkish restaurant here in Kyoto) includes potters and painters, calligraphers and printmakers, papermakers and several textile people. Kyoto is, afterall, the textile capital of old Japan and attracts fabric enthusiasts, collectors and artists from around the world. And the beauty of Japanese paper is legendary throughout the world.

Kiyomi Yatsuhashi from Boston, Massachusetts (front left in the photo) specializes in the most beautiful indigo blue fabric dyeing and Deborah Stout, a papermaker from Australia (way small on the right in the back of the photo) makes the most beautiful lamps and wall hangings from her own hand-made paper. As a group, we share information on places to buy art supplies, techniques and inspirations, and create exhibition opportunities for our work.

A recent exhibition by Regina Altherr (second from the left in the group photo above), a potter from Switzerland, shows the fabulous influence Japan can have on an artist’s work. And so it is with each of us, bringing the skills and talents we developed in our home countries into play with the culture and mythos that surrounds our lives in Japan.

On Saturdays, I study flowers.

Just as community groups in the west might gather in a church hall, my flowers class rents a room in one of the local temples. There are perhaps 15 of us, but the class time is flexible with people coming and going throughout the afternoon as suits their own schedule. Like most Japanese temples, the grounds include an beautiful garden with a small koi pond that we can see while we work on our arrangements. Ono-sensei, our teacher, has been studying flowers for more than 30 years and her arrangements are simply amazing. I’ve been studying for about 5 months now, my arrangements are decidely UN-amazing, but I’m hoping to do better.



Learning Ikebana is more complicated than just learning to stick flowers in a vase nicely. At my first class, there was so much information about lines and angles and degrees that it felt more like a geometry lesson. Everyone receives a package of flowers and foliage that are generically referred to as “the materials”. And then with whatever materials you’ve received that week, you endeavor to create something pleasing within a particular katachi (a model style or form). Each katachi is defined by dominant lines and angles of placement, which is where the feeling of geometry comes in.


And of course, seasonality. Ikebana is a compound word composed of ikeru (to live) and hana (flowers), that is, “living flowers”. Seasonality is a reflection of the life cycle. The lotus at left are shown in summer and fall arrangements, mirroring the life cycle of the plant. Even the withering leaves have beauty.


Both of these lotus compositions are advanced arangements using nageire (upright vase), far too advanced for a mere beginner such as myself. The forms taught at my level are much simpler and use wide shallow bowls or a small pedestal bowl as shown below. All three of these arrangements show hiraku-katachi (radial form). Despite the use of different materials, the dominant lines are similar. The top and bottom arrangements were done by my classmates, while the middle arrangement is mine (with lots and lots of coaching from Ono-sensei).

There are few things in life that speak so eloquently of luxury and elegance as filling your home with fresh flowers. And it is a treasure indeed to find so lovely a group of women who come together each week just for the love of flowers. It’s the same with my embroidery and sewing friends, so lovely to build social relations around the sharing of something wonderful.