Nasanunaka Possibly 1913 - 1919

Shunyo Yanagawa made this small painting, Nasanunaka, with ink and colour on paper. This feels like a book cover, with the image set against a cream background. You can see the soft texture of the paper, and the faint ghost of a grid underneath. It's really light and airy. Look at those lavender-colored shapes and the leaves that curl up, it’s really pretty. I imagine Yanagawa, bending over their work, carefully drawing and redrawing those shapes, trying to find just the right balance between representation and something more abstract. A dance between intention and accident. I wonder if they were thinking about other artists when they were making this? Maybe they were thinking about their teachers, or peers, or even artists from the past. There is a dialogue between artists that's constant, right? Each of us builds on what came before, responding, reacting, and pushing in new directions. It is an embodied expression which embraces uncertainty, allowing for multiple interpretations.