Living in a small mountain village just outside of Tokyo, I grow a crop of indigo every year and process the leaves into dye using traditional methods. I also breed silk moths, raise the silkworms and then reel/spin the silk from the cocoons. The silk is then dyed with natural dyes and finally woven on traditional Japanese looms. I run several ten-day live-in workshops a year at the old farmhouse here in Japan focusing on the Japanese use of indigo. Contact me for information.
Friday, 29 January 2010
Children and Art
One of the pleasures of last falls exhibition in Europe was having children visit the exhibition and attend the Japanese cultural workshops we held. As Barbara said,"Think of how horrible life would be with out art." Her words took me back a few steps from my jadedness. The kids were curious and excited about the exhibition. The ceramics and textiles and metal work offered enough variety and they didn't get bored. After the tour of the exhibition the kids all did some tie dye with indigo. We packed a lot into the limited time we had.