chakaiki:the traditional record of a tea gathering which notes the utensils used, the names of the guests, and so on.
We have chakaiki of the events in between 1993-2018.
please see this page to see what happened after 2018.
When I held the exhibition of Mitsuru Ezaki in July 2015, I felt a deep and joyful sense of fulfillment.
It was also around that time that services enabling the creation of photo books from a single copy had become widely available.
So I began compiling each exhibition—from preparations to takedown, including photos of visitors and even the names written in the guestbook—into a photo book resembling a chakaiki, the traditional record of a tea gathering which notes the utensils used, the names of the guests, and so on.
For each exhibition, I created two copies: one for the La Neige archive, and one to present to the artist.
I was able to continue this practice until the exhibition of Atsuo Yamagishi in September 2018.
I also went back and compiled a single volume covering the exhibitions held from 1993 to 2015.
This time, I saved some chakaiki which I could find their manuscript as PDF.
If you click each photo of the cover, you can see the inside of these books.
1993-2015
July 2015
wood-block print and pottery
Collected by Yuki Yomo
May 2017
oil paintings and Chinese ink paintings
by Gaku Azuma
April-October 2018
“The Color of the Space”
May 2018
Japanese Lacquer works
September 2018
Although the original manuscript for the photo book of Shigeko Kono’s October 2017 exhibition has not been found, you can see the daily records in the discussion section of the Facebook event page.
Please take a look there if you’re interested.
The display stands currently used at La Neige were originally created for this exhibition, and I believe they helped to create a very beautiful space.
Please click on the cover photo to view it.
If you are interested in what happened after 2018, please see this page: it summarizes the activities after that period—when I could no longer produce the photo books due to increasing busyness.
Photos of visitors may not hold much meaning in a conventional context.
However, for our “tea gatherings,” the irreplaceable smiles of our guests—those once-in-a-lifetime encounters—are what we cherish the most.
I would be truly honored if you would take a moment to browse through them.