Post 9/11

These set of works seem proper to categorize them as "Post 9/11" paintings. They reflect Fujimura’s journey with T.S. Eliot, and Dante, to recover his imaginative vision during the aftermath of 9/11/2001, living in ground zero, New York City.

Thanks to the friend, Hiroshi Senju, together they hosted a series of art exhibits, performances, and collaborations from November of 2001 to April of 2002. Called TriBeCa Temporary, they wanted to create a "ground zero tea house: an oasis of collaboration for local artists."

Fujimura’s account of TriBeCa Temporary, and post 9/11 thoughts are captured in "The Fallen Towers and the Art of Tea." (later published in Image Journal, and reedited and modified in Refractions: a Journey of Art, Faith and Culture)

12th Night, 2008

Mineral Pigments, Platinum and Gold on Kumohada
69.6H x 69W in (diptych)

Twelfth Night was commissioned for a museum tour Nihonga exhibit in Japan (To-ki-Michi, A Survey of Contemporary Nihonga, Ueno Royal Museum, Hakodate Museum, Ishikawa Prefectural Museum, and twelve other museums throughout Japan.) Fujimura overlapped a Shakesperian title with 12th, a day after 9/11. This is an elegy in the form of weeping cherry, Japanese symbol ephemeral beauty, and now his personal symbol of enduring hope during dark times.

Still Point, 2003

Mineral Pigments, Gold Powder on Kumohada
89H x 66W in

At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless;
Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is,
But neither arrest nor movement. And do not call it fixity,
Where past and future are gathered. Neither movement from nor towards,
Neither ascent nor decline. Except for the point, the still point,
There would be no dance, and there is only the dance.
T.S. Eliot, Four Quartets

Collection of Howard Lutnik

Splendor - Ghost

Mineral Pigments on Kumohada
89H x 66W in

Collection of Taylor, Clayton and Lydia Fujimura Trust

Splendor for Kayama

Mineral Pigments, Gold on Kumohada

Fujimura writes in Refractions: a journey of art, faith, and culture:
”Nihonga (Japanese-style painting) master Matazo Kayama passed away in April of 2004. When I heard the news, I began a painting called Splendor, which was exhibited in his memory that fall in TriBeCa, New York City...Professor Kayama selected me to be the first artist outside of their traditional curriculum in the prestigious post-MFA program, an extension of the lineage that has been in existence since fourteenth-century Japan (I came in as an "outsider," an American with a Japanese National Scholarship.)"

Between Two Waves of the Sea

Mineral Pigments on Kumohada
89H x 66W in

But heard, half-heard, in the stillness
Between two waves of the sea.
T.S. Eliot, Four Quartets

Zero Summer

Gold, Tarnished Silver, Mineral Pigments on Kumohada
89H x 66W in

Than that of summer, neither budding nor fading,
Not in the scheme of generation.
Where is the summer, the unimaginable
Zero summer?
T.S. Eliot, Four Quartets

Private Collection

Still Point - Evening

Mineral Pigments, Gold on Kumohada

Collection on Kikkoman Corporation, Tokyo

Still Point - Morning Star, 2003

Mineral Pigments and Gold on Kumohada
70.8H x 70.8W in

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Makoto: Post 9/11