“Shisei no Sankyo” by Morihiro Hosokawa Press Conference Interview
April 21,2010 – Maison Hermès 8th Floor “Le Forum”
Prior to the opening of “Shisei no Sankyo (Hermitage in the City)” Exhibition by Morihiro Hosokawa, a press conference was held. In the interview, artist Morihiro Hosokawa and architect Terunobu Fujimori, designer of the tea house ‘A bientôt,’ talked about how this exhibition took form. Later, Mr. Hosokawa showed us around the venue explaining on each of his works and the idea he had of this exhibition.
Hosokawa: Since I retired from politics about 10 years ago, I live a simple life of seikô udoku (farm when it’s sunny, read when it rains) in Yugawara-machi, Kanagawa. The atelier, teahouse and kiln that I have there were designed by Fujimori-sensei.
I spend my days making pottery, writing poems and reading books. And I also picked up oil painting from about a year ago. This was because pottery often gets cracked or chipped while being fired in the kiln. They are repaired by a traditional method called kanatsugi using lacquer and at times the piece is reborn into a masterpiece. Of course, there is a specialist who does the repairing, but the cost is very expensive. That’s why I started to do it myself by learning how to handle Japanese lacquer.
Then I started to find the process very interesting. Lacquer comes in the form of a tube, just like oil paint tubes, and I thought of painting a picture on paper with lacquer. The next thing I did was to paint on canvas like oil painting, and I quite liked it. This way my interest developed into painting pictures. When you put your work of pottery or calligraphy in a box, you have to make an inscription which we call hakogaki (autograph or note of authentication written on a box containing an art work). We also apply lacquer when we make a chashaku (tea scoop) for tea ceremony. All of these familiar procedures led me to opening a new door to oil painting.
I’m truly grateful to the opportunity of having an exhibition here. However, when I visited this gallery, I was told that the exhibitions in the past decade were mostly of modern art. My honest expression was, “Wow, this is a challenging space!” I felt I wasn’t capable enough to hold the exhibition all by myself, so I asked Fujimori-sensei for help.
In Yugawara, I live a secluded life of seikô udoku like a hermit. In the world of tea ceremony, we call this way of life sekibaku sôan (quiet, lonesome hermitage), which relates to the world of Buddha. For the exhibition I selected oil paintings that have special connection with Buddhism.
Some pieces may seem unrelated, but I will come back why I included them in the collection later on.
Fujimori: The first structure that I designed at Futô-an in Yugawara was an atelier. Then it was a tea house, but Mr. Hosokawa always makes a request on short notice. He asked me if I could make the tea house “Ichiyatei” within a month! It’s true that Sen no Rikyu built a tea house in a week for Hideyoshi Toyotomi who was heading for the battlefield. Hideyoshi was greatly pleased by Rikyu’s invitation to the tea house on his way to battle.
Mr. Hosokawa told me that then President Jacques Chirac of France was visiting him and that he wanted to welcome him in the tea house. I think it was the first time since Rikyu that a tea house was built in a haste to entertain a guest. I managed to complete it somehow. A conventional method would take too long so I asked the Haiyuza, a theatrical company, experienced in making stage settings, to do the job. You might not believe it, but the structure is made of aluminium. When I asked them if aluminium was more expensive, they replied that aluminium is better than wood considering the cheaper labor cost for transporting.” The tea house looks old but it’s made of aluminium.
This time I got another sudden phone call from Mr. Hosokawa. He said, “Can you make a tea house at Maison Hermès?” I thought it wasn’t a place for a tea house. I’ve held exhibitions at Maison Hermès before and I know that it’s a rectangular space, which is good for modern art but not so for other artwork. Nevertheless, I decided to take the offer because I knew from my experience that people at Hermès were very cooperative. Though it’s a simple tea house made within a short period of time, I’m quite satisfied with the outcome. If I were given another opportunity, I would like to make structures like this by using a similar method.
Approach to Shisei no Sankyo: sotoroji (outer garden)
Hosokawa: I divided the venue into three areas. The world of quiet lonesome hermitage is expressed in the tea house designed by Fujimori-sensei identifying with the simple life that I lead in Yugawara. The vaulted ceiling reaching the eighth and ninth floors, the central area that looks like a pathway and the area extending beyond the vaulted ceiling ― I have related the front open area to “sotoroji” in the world of tea ceremony, the pathway to “uchiroji (inner garden)” and the back area to “sôan (hermitage).”
As you step into the large area, the glass plate resembles a stream, a brook or a path leading to the hermitage. The tea bowls displayed represent the petals or Buddha’s lotus flower. I have decided that the row of pillars here represent a bamboo grove. The painting of a lotus flower hung in the back is done in oil and acrylic paint. As you know, the lotus represents Bodhi (enlightenment), so I thought it was perfect for this area. You don’t see many paintings of the lotus flower in oil, do you? And in the far corner, you see a child sitting chin in hand, as if the child is peering at something.
Turning back to the large wall that stretches up to the ceiling, you see a painting of the Kumamoto Castle standing over the stone wall. This is the only painting that seems unrelated to the world of Buddha, but when I walked into this section and looked at the glazed wall, the image of the stone wall of the Kumamoto Castle suddenly came into my head. So I made a bold decision to make a painting of the stone wall and hang it there. Since the painting was too large to work on in my small atelier, I brought it to my office and let it lean against the wall. I had to lie down on the floor to do the lower part. It didn’t take me long to finish it, though. The floor underneath the painting is covered with moss and deformed jar is displayed tilted.
Area leading to the sôan hermitage: uchiroji inner garden
As you move on from sotoroji area to uchiroji, the first thing you will find is a plate that I made for this exhibition using Shigaraki clay, displayed on the table. The plate has a carriage, one of Hermès motifs, initial “H” and some other patterns painted both on the front and back sides. And the motif of this painting is a weeping cherry tree that grows in my garden in Yugawara.
After passing the uchiroji adorned with cherry blossoms, we proceed further to the inner section where you see a Shigaraki earthenware jar on the right side. The flower I arranged in the jar is called yamabuki (Japanese rose) which my friend picked from his garden this morning. The scroll hanging on the wall is calligraphy of Chinese characters phonetically describing the phrase “que será, será.” I know this is not French, but the phrase flashed into my imagination when I was thinking what kind of calligraphy I could create for Hermès. Hengaku (a horizontal frame) that you find in the tea house is a work of calligraphy written “A bientôt” in Chinese characters. It was also created from the same reason.
The painting here in the hallway depicts the tower of Yakushiji Temple at sunset, one of my early paintings. I wanted to describe the serene atmosphere using only oil paint. The one right next to it is a profile of the seated Bosatsu at Chûgûji Temple. It’s my favorite and the most recent painting that I made just four weeks ago.
Quiet sôan and Tea House
Lastly, you will reach the inner sôan section where the tea house designed by Fujimori-sensei is installed. Inside you will see a small hengaku frame with the name of the tea house “A bientôt” inscribed in calligraphy. I have displayed a furosaki-byôbu screen (a two-panel, free-standing screen) in the tea room with a Chinese poem, and on the wall behind the screen, there is a scroll of patched paper with the characters “shiki soku zekû (Form is the emptiness. Emptiness is the form.) In the moss garden here, you can see a Buddhist figure, a five-storied pagoda and a devil roof tile, all of Shigaraki earthenware. On the front wall here, I have hung frames which relate to the world of Buddha; the guardian god of Hôryûji Temple, and the hands of Kudara Kannon goddess, magnolias, and the profile of the eleven-faced Kannon goddess of Kôgenji Temple. The painting on the very left is the main gate of Kôyasan. Turn around, and you will see a picture of Daruma painted in oil and sumi (ink). Daruma’s beard is drawn in ink. I’m sure nobody would use sumi and oil in one painting, but I wanted to use sumi to express the thin lines of the beard, which would be thicker in oil painting. In fact, I find the outcome very interesting.
Fujimori: As Mr. Hosokawa pointed out, this area has an especially high ceiling. I realized the true meaning of his idea when he explained that he had interpreted this area to a landscape. Probably, he had given me the same explanation in the very beginning, but I had forgotten about it. Being here myself, I fully agree that the height could be used in a landscape. And now I know that the moss I used was a perfect element. First I was at a loss how to express the atmosphere of “Shisei no sankyo (Hermitage in the City).” I once remembered making a tower of moss before and its versatility. So I decided to use it again for the exhibition. It turned out better than I had expected. With the moss, the tea house looks as if it had been there for a long time. (He squats.) See here. Clovers sprouted from seeds which had accidentally fallen on the moss. Plants like this makes the moss look natural and old. The two seeds couldn’t have been planted by somebody, they must have grown naturally. This kind of wild plant is more effective in producing the atmosphere of a hermitage than arranged flowers or bonsai. It helps create the natural world in a room. I learned for the first time that moss has the power of relating the mountains and fields. I had a wonderful experience through the exhibition.
The board used for the tea house is made of excellent laminated lumber manufactured exclusively in Japan. We all know that laminated lumber originated in Europe and the U.S., not in Japan. It has outstanding performance but doesn’t look like wood anymore. A typical type of laminated lumber made in the U.S. is produced by cutting the wood into fine chips and then molding it into a board using glue. Another common method used in Japan is the katsuramuki technique. Plywood or laminated lumber loses the appearance of wood in the process. However, there is a product called J-panel produced only in Japan. “J” in J-panel stands for Japan. The unpatented technique was developed and spread by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport in the past. J-panels are easy to handle, free of distortion, and yet maintains the quality sensation of wood. I am the first to use J-panels in an exhibit because they are usually used in parts like groundwork where people do not notice.
When we look at the whole setting, we can see that the Buddha figures are placed in a landscape. We seldom see paintings hung at random on the wall, but I’m impressed to see that they blend so well in the landscape.
The boards in the back of the tea house are yakisugi (charred cedar) made by burning the surface of J-panels. We see this only in western Japan, because in eastern Japan they paint the boards with sumi to give the same effect. Yakisugi is one of the traditional Japanese techniques not found elsewhere in the world. I was worried if the charred board would not match with the atmosphere but I am actually surprised to see that it did. Regarding the pillar here, Mr. Hosokawa told me that it would resemble a bamboo. I thought it was a bit difficult to imagine a bamboo from a pillar with a quality sensation of iron. So I wrapped it with a rope and applied plaster over it. I think I did a good job.