Asamoya ni Mau Sakura ni Yadoru Ao (Blue in the Cherry Blossoms Dancing in the Morning Mist)

Cherry blossoms dancing in the morning mist.

This karakami piece is an expression of cherry blossoms fluttering up into the air against a backdrop of changing colors, from the blue-black world at dawn through a blue tinged with purple and into a faint violet sky. 
Long ago, it was believed that cherry blossoms were where the rice paddy deities resided. For that reason, the Japanese name “sakura,” combines sa meaning the “grain spirit” or “grain deity,” with kura, meaning “seat.” In other words, it was the seat of the deity.
We can feel the intensity and beauty of life in the sakura blossoms precisely because of their transient nature as they bloom ever so briefly before they scatter. 

I want you to feel the breath that dwells in the quietly drifting cherry blossoms. 

Toto Akihiko

※ April 5, 2013 Introduced artwork on the NHK program “The Mark of Beauty.”