Lyn Bishop : Sharing Secrets

I know this may sound crazy, but I have conversations with my art. Yup, it’s true, I talk with my work, and then allow myself to connect with the quiet energy that it communicates back in response.

I became conscious of my conversations during my exhibit in Kyoto last year. Perhaps it stemmed from the daily prayers that I offered at the small temple along Tetsugaku-no-Michi (Philosophers Path), or the quiet moments inside the temple before I opened the heavy doors, or maybe I’ve been doing it unconsciously since who knows when. However it started, it’s become ritual, especially during exhibits.

I think, in general, we artists invest tremendous amounts of love and care into our work and often find it difficult to let the work have a life of its own after it is finished. We often want to protect it, as if it were a child. We want the collector to love it as much as we do.
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In my husband’s hometown of Kyoto, Japan, there are many places to enjoy contemporary art around the ancient capital. However, tucked quietly on a side street on the east side of Tetsugaku-no-Michi (Philosophers’ Path) sits the lovely Honen-in, it’s temple halls set back into the the woods surrounded by it’s carefully raked gardens and moss covered thatched San-mon gate.

Honen-in is an unlikely place to view art, and as such, presents the viewer with a surprising contemplative space to see a wide range of exhibits. Two of it’s halls offer rotating exhibitions, usually a week in length, that present art that ranges from the traditional to the contemporary. Many artists have exhibited their work in this space, including my colleagues Janet Echelman and Markuz Wernli.
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