From the archive, September 25, 2012: looking back on "Bokusho-ten 2012," an exhibition held at the Museum of Modern Art, Saitama.

Opened a year and a half after the Great East Japan Earthquake, this show laid bare the raw soul and resolve of the artist.

"Bokusho-ten 2012" at the Museum of Modern Art, Saitama

The exhibition featured approximately 130 works by Chosho Yabe and her Masumi Shodo Class students.

Gathered together, each piece — built up through daily practice — revealed the breadth and depth of calligraphy as an art form.

Among them, one work stopped visitors in their tracks with its sheer intensity.

"Sei" (Life): A One-Take Outburst of the Soul

The piece that held so many visitors was the character "Sei" (Life), written in the immediate aftermath of the disaster amidst crushing fear and anxiety.

"To live is not something we can take for granted" — it was a vow of gratitude for having survived, and a promise to live with all one's might.

It was not practiced. It was not calculated. It was a one-take outburst of emotion that could never be written again.

Works Carrying Prayers for the Disaster Areas

Other monumental pieces were also displayed: "Inori" (Prayer) and "Fukkou" (Reconstruction), written one year after the quake to embody hope, and the "Heart Sutra," a requiem for the souls that were lost.

"Arukimashou" (Let's Walk), created after visiting the devastated areas and meeting the people there, expresses a quiet resolve to keep walking alongside them.

A Visitor's Tears, and What a Calligrapher Can Do

During the exhibition, an evacuee who had been forced to leave Sendai for Saitama came to the gallery. With tears in their eyes, they told Chosho, "I am so glad I came."

A work that stays in people's hearts is not something you can produce on demand.

It is born when you stand on the precipice, beyond your own will. "All a calligrapher can do is express with ink" — that resolve made this a week that shook the hearts of everyone who saw it.

Records of exhibitions and calligraphy works are gathered on the ARTWORKS page.

For inquiries about exhibitions or commissioned works, please feel free to contact me.