Julia Takahashi
Tesuque, NM
Heart Eye of the Universe
Mixed Media
40” x 30” x 1”
2022
$2200
About
Julia Takahashi started her artistic career as a ceramicist, became a practicing architect and is now working in oil and mixed media. She is a “happa” with a Japanese father and a mother from an old New England family. This background, in the context of American race relations provided a strong grounding in the power of being a bridge between cultures. She has an undergraduate degree in Environmental Design and a Masters of Architecture and Urban Design, both from the University of Colorado.
Artist Statement
My work explores the Japanese aesthetic and philosophical notion of mono no aware. A direct translation might be, “things of wow-ness!”; although the meaning is most often described as “the transience of life” or the “bittersweet poignancy of things.” In my paintings, I create dichotomies of luminescence and decay, of color and non-color and the use of marks and gestures that float over one another to create depth and to express my deeply felt sense of the multitudinous layers that make up our world and our lives. Much of my current inspiration comes from my inner journey as it is informed by the storied landscape that surrounds me in Northern New Mexico. I watch the sun transverse across wide vistas colors always changing, the clouds form and reshape, the shadows short and long and at the end of the day the glorious sunsets that grace this part of the world. At night, I seek out the milky way in our velvety black skies and I believe I have a special relationship with the moon. If I have a goal, it is to become so wise and “empty” that I would be able to make such deep and magnificent marks with one stroke of the brush as the fabled Zen masters.
