(This talk recording is audio only!)
On February 9, 2022, Dr. Eugenia Bogdanova-Kummer presented a talk on postwar Japanese calligraphy. Based on her recent book Bokujinkai: Japanese Calligraphy and the Postwar Avant-Garde, she introduced the Kyoto-based avant-garde calligraphy group named Bokujinkai, and explored their international trajectories. Bokujinkai—or “People of the Ink”—was a group formed in 1952 by five calligraphers: Morita Shiryū, Inoue Yūichi, Eguchi Sōgen, Nakamura Bokushi and Sekiya Yoshimichi. In the early postwar years, avant-garde calligraphers from Japan radically transformed their art with the aim of bringing calligraphy to the same level of recognition as abstract painting. In order to reach this goal, they launched creative collaborations with European Art Informel artists and American Abstract Expressionists, and soon started sharing exhibition spaces with them at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, Documenta in Kassel, São Paulo Biennale and Carnegie International.
Dr. Bogdanova-Kummer examined the role that the postwar global Zen movement played in shaping the success of Japanese calligraphy abroad and presented their collaborations as one of the most fascinating examples of the early postwar global art exchanges.