百合匂う • At first brushstroke • Hiroko Yoshimoto
Paintings by Hiroko Yoshimoto
Haikus by Teiko Yoshimoto
Translations by Shoko Yoshimoto Miura, PhD
Ventura based artist Hiroko Yoshimoto cultivated a love of nature from her mother Teiko, who loved to garden in the small front and backyard of their Tokyo house. Her and her sister Shoko planted tulip, anemone and peony bulbs and waited for the forceful pointy shoots to break ground in the spring. Together with their father, they’d visit the Tokyo University Botanical Gardens in walking distance with rice balls and tea.
In the last 20 years of her life, Teiko fell ill with a damaged heart. She took up haiku writing and carried a notebook with her everywhere she went to jot down her impressions of what she saw and felt. Her poems were published in Tochi magazine, published in Japan.
Hiroko recalls a conversation she had with her mother in the family’s garden on one of her good days in later life, “it’s worth living even just to watch the grass leaves sprouting and flower buds opening,” said Teiko.
For Lum Art Zine, Shoko has translated a selection of Teiko’s haikus to accompany paintings from Hiroko’s series, “Biodiversity,” both studies in the diversity of life forms, from the microbes in a drop of water to the stroke of a bamboo brush.
Hiroko Yoshimoto, “Biodiversity #5,” Oil on Canvas, 85”x68”.
新絹の白妙展べて藍を溶く
Stretching the whiteness of pure silk
I mix the shades of
Deep indigo
Hiroko Yoshimoto, “Biodiversity #93,” Oil on Canvas, 86”x80”.
メキシコへ鉄柵越ゆる草の絮
Fluffs of grass
Float over the border wall
Of Mexico
Hiroko Yoshimoto, “Biodiversity #22,” Oil on Panel, 30”x60”.
Hiroko Yoshimoto, “Biodiversity #118,” Oil on Canvas, 60”x104”.
ユウカリに夜寒ひしめく渡り蝶
In the cold of the night
Migrant monarchs throng
On eucalyptus leaves
Hiroko Yoshimoto, “Biodiversity #120,” Oil on Canvas, 50”x86”.
鯨見に航く船恋ふてひとり病む
They went to see the whales —
Ill and alone
I long to be on that boat
Hiroko Yoshimoto, “April #2,” Sumi Ink on Paper, 40”x30”.
百合匂う絹に絵筆をおろす時
At the first brushstroke
Of lilies on silk
The air fills with fragrance
Pages of Teiko Yoshimoto’s haikus in her calligraphy.
Partial page from Pangolin Magazine, Vol.1, Issue 2, 1989, p. 8, and Teiko Yoshimoto’s obituary.
Hiroko Yoshimoto’s diptych “Biodiversity #22” from the Biodiversity series belongs to the permanent collection of Santa Paula Art Museum.
COVER IMAGE: Hiroko Yoshimoto, “Biodiversity #94,” Oil on Canvas, 50”x70”.
