Sōfū Teshigahara

Sōfū Teshigahara was a central figure to the development of postwar Japanese art. He is best known as the founder of the Sogetsu school of Ikebana, the Japanese art of flower arrangement. His artistic output includes painting, calligraphy, sculpture and countless unparalleled Ikebana constellations. Thinking about the relationship of Ikebana with space, Teshigahara was looking for innovative forms, reflecting both beauty and decay, and capable of expressive storytelling through minimal appearance. He taught his students not to produce a facsimile of something in the material world, but rather give shape to thoughts and feelings that exist within them. Engaging with the experimental ethos of modern art, Teshigahara set to combine plants with hand-crafted vases. Later he followed on to entirely eliminate plants, which resulted in purely sculptural works.