“Listen to What You Cannot See”

A field in the mountains near the sea in western Toyama Prefecture. Distressed by the state of the abandoned plot, Hayashiguchi started working with her parents a few years ago, tending the field between jobs. She would gather together the wild thistle, chocolate vine, jasmine and other colorful flowers.

“ ‘Thank you for showing me such beautiful things. May they share their beauty in my home. Amen.’ I give thanks like this out loud. Maybe it seems a little crazy. [Laughter.]”

She feels very grateful when she think about the relationship between people and nature.

“I’m sometimes so moved by the beauty in the world I could cry. I wonder why that is.”

The feeling that arises seems to have no apparent reason and could be from some invisible force of nature itself. She has been involved in the production of art and music since she was young, but the root of all of it has been “to convey something that cannot be seen.”

Consciously Making Time as a Human “Being”

Producing music albums and kogei promotion projects, directing online stores, launching hotels and facilities that highlight Toyama… Hayaguchi’s array of activities may seem dizzying, but throughout her day to day life, she sets aside her hectic schedule, practicing kintsugi [the art of patching broken porcelain with lacquer and gold], or performing a tea ceremony, savoring her time whisking and drinking a bowl of matcha tea.

“It’s a conscious effort to make that kind of time because I’m getting so busy. Whether I’m tending the field or gluing a kintsugi piece, as I move my body to interact with the materials I work with, I give it all my concentration. It’s necessary to absorb myself in it and not think about other things.”

It’s said that immersing oneself in the work of one’s hands clears out the mental debris that accumulates when the brain has been working tirelessly too long. Even science can confirm its effectiveness. Certainly, one can feel a meditative effect in the endless picking of plums or the polishing of leather goods.

“Our emotions are sometimes unreasonable and overwhelming. What has an impression on the mind also feeds it. People often remember to eat well to nourish their bodies, but by not also nourishing the spirit, they make life more difficult.”

Nature alone is wonderful, of course, and there are likewise good things that come of the technologies that people create, but she feels the greatest “nourishment” comes from what people and nature create together.

“I think people can create things that capture nature and emphasize its beauty.”

Kogei is also one of those things that nourish the spirit. One can put flowers picked from the garden or found along the mountainside into a treasured vase, or use a bowl by a favorite artisan for one’s breakfast, anything that can give you a little smile.

Hayashiguchi, who says she “can only do things when strongly motivated,” feels that all such things are a “food” for the soul.

The Toyama Climate, Where There is Ever Work

Hayashiguchi combines art and traditional craftwork with science and technology. What is created in the unraveling of rules while looking toward nature can be truly beautiful. She wants to use technology to make life beautiful and to make connections from that perspective. There is one axis within herself, she says, and from that axis, she kind find the connections to other things.

The roots of the project are in Buddhism. In Toyama, also known as the Kingdom of Shin Buddhism where the Jodo Shinshu sect of Japanese Buddhism thrives, she grew up with the habit of praying at Buddhist altars every morning. Though she does not believe in the existence of Amitābha or the “Pure Land,” she does feel there is a greater existence outside of simple society comprised of the relationships people share.

She had once thought, “I can’t get the things I love without going to the city,” and left the countryside. But eight years ago, after the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake, she returned and realized that, “Everything was here.”

“There’s a breathtaking view of the Tateyama mountain range, there is the sea, and there is a plain peppered with beautiful villages. It’s not an easy life, but it’s full of variety and abundance, and if you take it seriously, you can share your blessings. Once I stepped outside myself, I realized that this is a place where it’s easy to keep my hands working with nature.”

The market is lined with fish caught that morning, the water is clear and the rice filling, and the climate is suitable for developing kogei craftwork. There are figures offering bunches of flowers in their hands at the various temples throughout the city. There is a sense that life is connected to the sea, the mountains, the history, and that something great still remains.

At the same time, the handiwork that makes life so beautiful is rapidly fading. Under the growing sense of urgency, she’s recently begun joint projects with crafters.

“We need more people to work with us, now.”

“Anyone Can Create Beauty”

On day of this visit, the D&Department Toyama hosted an exhibition of the works of Keiichi Yasukawa (until Oct. 25), in which Hayashiguchi had visited the places associated with the artist and collected pieces for the exhibit.

Yasukawa had organized the Toyama Folk Art Association immediately after the war, produced Matsumoto folk craft furniture and was greatly involved in the folk art movement, not only within Toyama, but throughout Japan. Despite his achievements, his name is less known.

“About a year and a half ago, I visited the training dojo at Zentoku-ji Temple in Johana, Nanto, Toyama, and was impressed by the beauty of the space. (Zentoku-ji has a known relationship with folk art and is where Muneyoshi Yanagi wrote his the Buddhist companion piece, ‘Bi no Homon’ [‘The Dharma Gate of Beauty’].) Yasukawa had designed that space. It seems a waste that it’s not being used, so I’m hoping with Kenmei Nagaoka’s help we can create ‘a place to learn about living’ with an exhibition space, a library, a shop, a café, and lodging facilities.”

Around this same time last year, Hayashiguchi was putting on exhibits about the deep connection between Toyama and its folk art. When asked about her focus on folk art now, she says, “I didn’t change my direction so much as realize the connection between folk art and myself.”

“To Yanagi, the beauty created in the collaboration of humans and nature, the work of great things, this was all folk art. If we definite folk art as the beauty of things whose creators are unknown, then a ‘traditional arts crafter’ becomes a contradiction of terms. This simply isn’t the case. A deeper examination of folk art shows that the idea is linked to human spirituality.”

If we think of folk lore in view of its essence, we find it’s not only in old bowls and utencils, but also in our spaces, music, food, and even our politics and economy. At the temple dojo, designed by Yasukawa, Hayashiguchi hopes to help us reconsider folk art as it exists in our daily life and to rethink the view with which it has previously been so narrowly defined.

“Yanagi says we’re born with an instinct to create beautiful things. That is as true for the the user as the creator. I hope we can live aware that anyone can create beauty.”