WABI-SABI POETRY

Wabi-sabi is hard to define. The Japanese love ambiguity and believe that no deep understanding can come with the spoken word. Zen beliefs are also not easily explained with words and wabi-sabi emerged from Zen tenets. To explain them with words would diminish them. Zen led to the birth of the tea ceremony and wabi-sabi grew out of the tea ceremony.

image found at Wasbella102.tumblr.com here.

Therefore, both Zen and wabi-sabi maintain a mysterious, elusive quality. The fullest explanation is that they are a way of life, with an appreciation of a particular type of beauty or aesthetic.

image by nikola - n k l s at Flickr site here.

Wabi-sabi is an appreciation of things imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete. It is a beauty of
things modest, humble and unconventional.

image found at indigenousdialogues.tumblr.com here.

All things are impermanent. All things are imperfect. All things are incomplete.

Things are either devolving toward or evolving from NOTHINGNESS. Nothingness does not have the same meaning as in Western cultures. Zen followers see new things or life emerge out of 'nothingness'.

India Flint's eco-dyed bundle waiting to be opened. blog here.

Nothingness is alive with possibilities.

image by Game Texture Images here.

Accept the inevitable... life is fleeting and transient.... impermanent. That is why Zen teaches one to live in the moment... focus on the intrinsic small details... and get rid of the unnecessary.

That is why Zen and wabi-sabi are so tied to nature. Truth comes from observing nature.

To be alone
It is of a color that
Cannot be named:
This mountain where cedars rise
Into the autumn dusk.
-- 12th century poet, Jakuren

Mineo Mizuno, moss on ceramic

There is a melancholy associated with the cycle of impermanence.. the transience of life and death. Everything is in flux, and one is invited to abandon yourself to the unrivaled beauty and natural imperfection of the fleeting world.

image by Veronika Studer at Flickr here.

Wabi is a way of life, with inward philosophical thinking. Sabi refers to the material objects, which convey the Wabi way of thinking. Words for wabi-sabi include: warm, dark, personal,

organic, ambiguous, seasonal, life and death, earthy, present (in the moment), decayed....

Charles Austin, teapot, image from Butters Gallery link here.

... weathered, rusty, rough, non-fnctional, irregular, not symmetrical....

Simplicity and focus on minimal details and subdued colors are very central to wabi-sabi.

An organic feel with little or no defined design is preferred. Objects are functional rather than decorative, with a naturalness and ease of use.

Dark, muted, subdued and limited colors are preferred. Rough edges are revered.

image by blackwood (no real name given), Flickr site here.

All that is uncared for.
Left alone in the stillness
in that pure silence married
to the stillness of nature.
--- Linda Gregg

Grace and a Show

Up Coming Gallery show announcement: Lucia Douglas Gallery, Bellingham, WA. Feb. 3-25th. A three person show with Cass Nevada, 2-D artist, and Brian O'neill, potter.
Opening reception: Thursday, Feb. 2. gallery website here.

"Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities have crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day. You shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense.--Emerson

This is how I try to begin each new year. A new start... with a look forward, not behind. I usually start with making lists for the year.. because I am a list maker. But this year I decided to give in to this word that has been at the edge of the shadows in my brain for awhile now-- GRACE... because I want more of it in my personal and art life. I found this quote some time ago: how you climb up the mountain is just as important as how you get down the mountain. and so it is with life, which for many of us becomes one big gigantic test followed by one big gigantic lesson.
in the end it all comes down to one word, grace. it's how you accept winning and losing, good luck and bad luck, the darkness and light. You can not separate your life from your art.

self portrait, collage

"You can have other words-chance, luck coincidence, serendipity. I"ll take grace. I don't know what it is exactly, but I'll take it." --- Mary Oliver.

"My belief is that it is most important for an artist to develop an approach and philosophy about life---if he has developed this philosophy, he does not put paint on canvas, he puts himself on canvas." -- Jacob Lawrence

I asked several friends to send me their description of the word GRACE. Some of these friends I know in my personal life and art, and some of them have connected with me online in the blog world.

Janna Gougeon, encaustic and collage, blog here.
"Two meanings come to mind: a gift of spirit.. always there..not always recognized; the second: with gentleness, sensitivity, respect, understanding."

Robyn Gordon, detail, wood carving. Blog here.
"Grace is the thread of goodness that meanders through my life...from the wild calls of Loeries at dawn, or the answer to a prayer. I find that we need to slow down to appreciate those moments of grace or we tend to miss many of them.

Ruth Armitage, acrylic, yupo paper. Blog and website here.
"Grace is when one exhibits apparently effortless kindness and acceptance. It is the most beautiful of the personal qualities because it is motivated by love for the world and mankind."

Tangie Belmore, acrylic and collage, website here.
Tangie believes Grace to be this: "an elegant sensibility of focus and passion with authentic composure. Serene, warmth, beauty, refinement, sensitive, calm, wisdom."

Leslie Avon Miller, collage, blog here.
"Tension is who you think you should be, relaxation is who I am. That is grace."

India Flint, eco (natural) print dyes on fabric. blog here.
"It is a word that I associate with my (late) maternal grandmother--who I never saw responding to any situation, no matter how stressful, with anything other than grace (even to me when I was a vile teenager). It is something I aspire to, not only as a person but also in my work, to have it appear as such, seemingly effortlessly formed, despite the turmoil that lies behind.

Nancy Neva Gagliano, her 'rapt' rocks series, blog here.

Grace surrounds me, and you,
Meshing us together.
Its that vibration blanketing our souls,
Protecting and nuturing.
And, Grace comforts me as it eases into awareness
In a moment of contemplation, during a pause,
Or during a time of appreciation,
Washing away worries when a slow breath is exhaled.
Grace is always there.
I am the one that is occasionally absent.
--- Nancy Neva Gagliano, January 21, 2012.

Boro: rags and tatters

new work, 2010, acrylic and collage rice papers

BORO: Rags and Tatters from the Far North of Japan. ed. Yukiko Koide and Kyoichi Tsuzuki.
The Boro shown in this book is the sum of 40 years of field work by researcher Chuzaburo Tanaka. A few decades ago, Tokoku and Aomori, the northern part of Japan (snow country), meant 'dire poverty' to most Japanese. These dirt poor farmers, out of desperate necessity, created an astonishing textile out of boro- mere rags. Boro became 'survival' and any scraps of old cloth were coveted. The smallest snippets were saved and re-used over and over until the rags finally turned to ash and returned to the soil. Work jackets to bedding, were stitched, layered and repaired over and over. This cultural heritage survived and is now revered.

Things wabi-sabi are expressions of time frozen. They are made of materials that are visibly vulnerable to the effects of weathering and human treatment. They record the sun, wind, rain, heat, and cold in a language of discoloration, rust, tarnish, stain, warping, shrinking, shriveling, and cracking...they still possess an undiminished poise and strength of character. Leonard Koren, WABI-SABI, for Artists, Designers, Poets & Philosophers

Things wabi-sabi are usually small, quiet and inward-oriented. They beckon: get close, touch, relate.

Things wabi-sabi may exhibit the effects of accident, like a broken bowl glued back together again. Or they may show the result of just letting things happen by chance.

India, who lives in Australia, makes felt using wool and water and woven textile fabrics, and dyes cloth using plants and water. You can find her very entertaining blog, Not All Those Who Wander Are Lost, here and her beautiful website here.

Regina lives on Caribbean island called Netherlands Antilles. She works with paper and fabric, and her beautiful blog, Mostly Turquoise, can be found here.

For this piece titled BRANCHING OUT, Lorraine at Creative Daily used photographs of branches and bare trees, which she digital manipulated, printed the images on fabric and then pieced them together for this journal cover. You can find her wonderful blog here.

QUILTS by Nikki Giovanni

When I am frayed and strained and drizzle at the end
Please someone cut a square and put me in a quilt
That I might keep some child warm
And some old person with no one else to talk to
Will hear my whispers