For more information about this art museum, please visit the following website.
Kitakamakura old private house Museam
Showing posts with label kita-kamakura. Show all posts
Showing posts with label kita-kamakura. Show all posts
June 26, 2026
Ajisai (hydrangea) flowers: Kita-kamakura Kominka-museum
February 15, 2026
September 2, 2025
Lily: Kita-kamakura
The sunlight grows ever stronger day by day, and the harsh heat continues to rage as if to burn the world to the ground. This summer season seems to be endless and ruthless to the living things that endure the fury of the sun.
The lily must be the true flower of summer, whose graceful petals and sweet scent cast a spell on us to awaken cool sensations and make us forget swelter for a moment.
Its large flowers never succumb to the oppression of the pitiless weather and, like a midsummer day's dream, keep blooming elegantly in the cruel sunlight to manifest the sparkle of life in this short, scorching season.
Lily: Kita-kamakura
The Yama-yuri (golden-rayed lily) is one of Japan's most popular lilies and is also known as “the queen of lilies” in Japan because of its particularly beautiful figure and very rich perfume.
The splendid flower of Yama-yuri is a typical summer flower of Japan. It grows wild in the mountain areas of Honshu from the Kanto region to the Chubu region and magically comes into view in midsummer.
This white flower is over 20 cm in diameter. Its petals have thick golden streaks and small reddish-brown spots. It keeps giving off a strong sweet fragrance even at night to captivate many pollinating insects.
The Yama-yuri has often been the subject of Japanese art because of its splendor and fragrance. Especially since the late Edo period, it has been incorporated into the paintings and crafts. It has been presented as a representative summer flower in the ”Ka-cho-hu-getsu” (flower, bird, wind, and moon) of the traditional seasonal themes of Japanese paintings.
It was often depicted in the schools of Ogata Korin and Sakai Hoitsu. The contrast between white and gold made the Yama-yuri lilies become the suitable subject for the highly decorative and refined Edo-rimpa-style paintings.
July 2, 2025
Suiren (water lily) flower: Kita-kamakura
Flowers are the silent storytellers that tell the tales of life and reincarnation on this small planet called the Earth.
Plants and trees bear flowers in the circulation of the seasons to begin their short but earnest reproductive activity, and eventually, within a few days, their flowers complete their mission of life and quickly disappear without leaving any traces.
The year-round lives of plants and trees are the long and patient preparation for their flowers as the organs for renewed growth and survival, and when their flowering is completed, they must return to a long stillness in their unremarkable figures.
As if to herald the beginning of the dazzling summer, a lovely flower of water lily has bloomed in my humble garden again this year. Before my eyes, the cycle of reincarnation is presenting itself secretly and this precious flower is quietly revealing the private story of life on this planet of water.
June 12, 2025
Fuji (Japanese wisteria) flowers: Kita-kamakura
From mid-April to early May, the drooping purple or white flowers of Fuji (Japanese wisteria) emerge suddenly all at once from the bushes of the fresh green, while giving off a sweet and elegant fragrance to let us notice their pleasant blooming.
From ancient times, the graceful figures of wisteria flowers in slender clusters have been admired by Japanese people and have been written about in Waka (traditional Japanese poetry) since the Nara and Heian periods (710-1185).
Their elegant figures have long been depicted in many Japanese picture scrolls and folding screen paintings. The gracefulness of their drooping flower clusters symbolizes fragility and elegance when they sway in the gentle spring breeze. This appearance evokes the deep feeling of beauty, which keenly arouses the pathos of nature which is at the root of the Japanese aesthetic senses.
The wisteria flower has traditionally been treated as the symbol of long-lasting nobleness and prosperity. The ladies of the Heian aristocracy adorned their hair with such wisteria flowers. The aristocracy incorporated wisteria flowers into their family crests and even used the forms of these flowers as a Yusoku-monyo (the traditional crests used by the court and nobility).
It is said that, at the time of full bloom, in the gardens of aristocrats, wisteria viewing parties had been held with graceful orchestral music to enjoy the precious beauty of the flowers.
July 11, 2024
Suiren (water lily) flower: Kita-kamakura
As the height of spring approaches, the temperature and sunlight increase gradually, and all manner of living things awaken from their winter slumber one by one.
In accordance with their profound wisdom genetically built up over billions of years, various birds having kept silence resume their lively chirping for mating, fresh greenery grows thickly at a tremendous pace, and numerous flowers begin to successively bloom in a hurried manner.
Bright spring shows us the gorgeous celebration and festivity of the nature lives, which rapidly change in the blink of an eye. All living things must be fleeting in this world and every beautiful flower appears and disappears all too soon before my eyes.
In order to try to bear the vanishing memories of the ephemeral spring flowers in mind, I hereby leave an assortment of these lovely flowers on record.
Iwatabako (Conandron ramondiodes) flowers: Kita-kamakura
I never know why every flower is so extravagantly beautiful. If they were simply the plant organs for reproduction, they would not need to be so diverse and beautiful.
At times I imagine that some transcendental being, that had designed this earth's ecosystem and organisms long, long ago, created these exquisite flowers for her enjoyment like a sacred horticulturist.
The star-shaped violet flowers of the Iwatabako are blooming on the mossy rocky surfaces in the shade as if to let us know the secret arrival of the long-awaited spring in Kita-kamakura.
These small (1-2 cm in diameter) and fragile flowers symbolize the quiet and contemplative atmosphere of Kita-kamakura which may be filled with the tranquil spirituality of the old Zen temples.
They seem to bloom and fade away without any hesitation, while having nothing to do with the clamors and poisons of our earthy world.
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