Where there is a magic road

Glimpse into Kijuro Yahagi’s photography:

Ishara Jayawardane

Hidden Japan is a unique photographic exhibition. It is also the story of a man who travelled 20,000 kilometres through Japan rediscovering its hidden beauty in the form of paintings. It is the story of KijuroYahagi and is also a collection of Art which is spiritual and meaningful.

The exhibition has been jointly organized by the Japanese embassy, the Japan Foundation and Vibhavi Academy of Fine Arts.

The exhibition itself spoke of an Absolute unhindered freedom of the painter. Having read the brochure containing the words of Kijuro Yahagi and having viewed his paintings I began to understand that I was in the presence of a man whose ‘presence’ was not dependent on his being physically present but who was present in the power of his paintings and in the clarity of his words.

I have to admit that my words cannot do justice to his stupendous intellectual curiosity, his connection with nature and his unique sense of creativity. Yahagi is a man who seems able to bend time. A man who can bend time in such a way that you are able to see his paintings done at different times contained in one physical space as if time itself was drawn into one room, present past and future all converging upon itself.

“So for a long time Japan and Sri Lanka have had a good relationship Japan has been giving us so many things from scholarships, cultural shows and film shows. There are so many opportunities for Sri Lankans to get the maximum from Japan. Day by day it develops. So many local painters and artists have come here. Some of them are the Photographic Society and Arts Society especially from the embassies and foreign missions.” Said Nayomi Wijesekera of the Japanese Embassy. Kijuro Yahagi explained his journey.

“As for my picture taking journey across Japan, first I must mention the midway through it is a major change in my attitude occurred. During the early stages of my journey, I would select a location to shoot, and head there, but I gradually began to question that practice. I could not help suspecting that a trip with no destination would yield more discoveries.

I therefore abandoned my practice of using the expressways to get to my destination in the shortest possible time. I began to use national highways, then prefectures and city roads and finally I consciously wandered onto forest paths and animal trails.”

“To my surprise,” went on Yahagi, “I found myself beginning to feel comfortable with no set destination and with no sense of direction or distance. A journey in which one walks the earth freely is a planar journey and even a spatial journey.

The word destination becomes meaningless in such a context. In other words, I came to indulge in the speculation, that if I could become a part of ‘nature’ with its many possibilities, I would be able to tap its energy. Based on the experience of journeying with no destination, I realized that one must allow oneself to be surprised before one can receive the energy ‘nature’ has to offer.

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