Kyoto and calligraphy

 From Wednesday April 16 to Saturday April 19 had calligraphy lessons with Chikako, a well known calligrapher, that I found through VAWAA. The first 3 days were in her studio, in the Arashiyama area in western Kyoto. On the last day I took part in a special event with her other students, held in a cultural centre nearby.

Chikako cmes from a family of calligraphers. Her mom is 90 and still teaches calligraphy, and her sister and daughter are also calligraphers.

We started the first day with some usual basics, but because of my experience in calligraphy I progressed through the exercises and the increasingly difficult styles quite quickly on the first day.

It was interesting that the lessons uncovered some bad habits I'd developed, particularly in doing the Kaisho (printed style) with a soft brush.  I also corrected my posture and the way I held the paper.

The second and third days were basically more practice with different characters in the Kaisho, Gyousho (semi-cursive), and Sousho (cursive) styles. The practice was with 4 characters per page, then six characters per page, and finally on longer paper.

The event on Saturday was really great. Chikako's family, and about 8 of her students were there. The students worked on  calligraphy pieces on large paper, for submission to a competition. 

I worked one as well, and Chikako applied the stamp for the group, and attached pieces to each end to make a scroll out of it.

I even tried doing something with the very large brush.

Each day, after the lesson, I had a little time to look around. On Wednesday, since it was near the studio, I went to Arashiyama Park and the famous bamboo grove. 

Afterwards, I thought I find a park to eat the food I'd packed for dinner, but there wasn't much open in the evening. I took the bus to Yasaka shrine, whuch is near the popular Gion area with its old narrow streets and restaurants and night spots. It was PACKED. The busses were too full so I ended up walking back to the hotel.

The next day after class I went to SanJuuSanGenDo temple, with its 1001 statues of Kannon bodhisatva. From there I went to a nearby calligraphy and ink painting supply store that Chikako recommended. On the way back to the hotel I found another place that serves craft beer, called Kyoto Craft House.

On Friday after class I tried to get to the Nijo castle, but it was already closed. So I had dinner at a soba restaurant and went to Kyoto Beer Lab again.

On Saturday, after the special event, I just went back to the hotel to do laundry and sort through all the papers of calligraphy practice I'd made in the last few days.

Afterward I had dinner at a restaurant across the street from the hotel called Gustos. You placed your order on a tablet on the table, and the food was brought by a robot waiter.

Next I went to a branch of Kyoto Beer Lab called KBL The Garage. I walked through sidestreets to get there. Interesting thing about Japan is that I  the sidestreets, every few blocks there is a little shrine or temple. I passed one where about 20 kids, about 10 years old, were walking in a circle playing flutes and drums - that slow melodic shrine music. Looked like they were practicing.