Wabi Sabi Hare

Collage by Donna Watson

Wabi Sabi is the Japanese aesthetic of finding beauty in imperfection,  incompleteness and impermanence.  It is a beauty of things modest and humble.  It is a beauty of things rustic, simple, organic, worn, weathered... things affected by the passage of time.  It is also about the cycle of life and our connection to nature.  It is an appreciation of nature and all life.  This is how I view the rabbit.  A quiet, still, silent, gentle, harmless (unless you have a vegetable garden) creature.

THE HARE WITH THE AMBER EYES is written by Edmund De Waal, a world famous ceramist working in Porcelain.  He inherited a collection of 264 tiny netsuke.  He wanted to know and understand who had collected them and how they had survived World War II.  The book is a moving 

memoir and detective story as he discovers the history of the netsuke and his family over 5 generations.  The writing is artful, detailed, exquisite... beautifully written memoir... and deeply moving.  He writes not just about the netsuke, but about the art and culture in each generation.

Here is the famous netsuke, THE HARE WITH THE AMBER EYES

Netsuke are miniature sculptures first created in 17th century Japan to serve a practical purpose.

Robes, like kimono, had no pockets.  Men who wore them needed a place to store their belongings like money, medicine, or pipes.  They used a container (sagemono) hung by cords from the robe's sashes (obi).  This box (inro) was held shut by ojime, small carved objects or animals.  The fastener that secured the chord at the top of the sash was a carved, button like toggle called netsuke.

Over time, Netsuke evolved from being utilitarian into objects of great artistic merit and superb craftmanship, highly respected and collected.

It is the quieter side of life that inspires me, with the feelings that come with my connection to the natural world.  My love of rabbits is part of my connection to nature.

This is a rabbit temple in the heart of Kyoto.  I was very happy to find it.

Artist Unknown

Artist W. Tucker,  RABBIT GIRL,  website:  www.wtucker-art.com

As you see above, artists today depict rabbits and hares in many mediums and forms.  

photo image by Donna Watson

The above image includes one of my ceramic rabbits, and 2 mail art envelopes I created.

photo image by Donna Watson

photo image by Donna Watson

Mono no aware refers to a feeling of life's fragility, and relates to seeing beauty in this fragile, impermanent nature, and even grasping that without permanence, genuine beauty can not exist.

Another New Year....

"Red Enso" collage by Donna Watson

Announcement of 2 March workshops:

      March 5-6:  WABI SABI AND THE SPIRIT OF COLLAGE:  Portland OR at the

      Sheraton Airport Hotel.  For more information on workshop, location, supply list,

      cost, and registration go to www.artandsoulretreat.com  

      March 19-20:  ZEN MEMORY BOOK (will make a folded accordion book on any theme

       such as memories, family, garden, pets, travel etc).  Matzke Fine Art Gallery, Camano 

       Island, WA.  Cost will include lunch.  For more information on location, cost, workshop,

       and registration contact Karla Matzke, 360-387-2759, matzke@camano.net, website:

       www.matzkefineart.com 

Folded book on Zen Gardens by Donna Watson

A NEW YEAR... Time to take stock of the past year and move forward... begin a new chapter...

be open to new possibilities... start over... learn from the past year and move on...

self portrait, journal page, by Donna Watson

Every January, I write down my goals for the new year.  I look at my list from last year and see what goals I met, and what goals I need to extend or continue to work on.  I am always a little disappointed in myself when I see what I accomplished and what I did not finish... and the list of what I did not finish always seems to be the longer list.

photo image by Donna Watson

And every year I go through the same goal setting list... making a new list... often with the same goals written down that were on last year's list.  And every year I am disappointed in myself.  So, this year,

I decided NOT to write another list of goals.

hand made scrolls by Donna Watson

Instead, I decided to make a different sort of list.  Not of goals to be met... or not met.  But to go inside myself more... more introspective and not set myself up for another year of disappointment when I do not meet all my goals....

photo image by Donna Watson

So here is my first one:  TO BECOME MORE MINDFUL.   To appreciate the small things around me, and to be more aware of moments -- live in the present moments.

photo image by Donna Watson

Here is another one:  GRACE...  to respond with more grace when I am disappointed or when a situation or person confronts me with a challenge.

And to be more POSITIVE... I am often accused of seeing "the glass half empty".  

Want the change.  Be inspired by the flame

Where everything shines as it disappears.

The artist, when sketching, loves nothing so much

as the curve of the body as it turns away.

What locks itself in sameness has congealed,

Is it safer to be gray and numb?

What turns hard becomes rigid

and it easily shattered.

Pour yourself like a fountain.

Flow into the knowledge that what you are seeking

finishes often at the start, and with ending, begins.

..... Rainer Maria Rilke, Sonnets to Orpheus, Part Two, XII

photo image of rabbit temple in Kyoto Japan, by Donna Watson