Miya Ando b. 1973

This painting by Miya Ando depicting a lunar eclipse reflecting on water was made by exposing mulberry paper to natural indigo dye. The title indicates the precise date and place at which Ando observed the phenomenon depicted in the work. The longer indigo makes contact with the surface of the paper, the darker blue the surface becomes. As Ando notes, “Indigo is like a little clock of coloration.” The painting belongs to a series of works Ando debuted in her solo exhibition Kumoji (Cloud Path / A Road Traversed By Birds And The Moon) at Kavi Gupta gallery in Chicago. The series depicts ephemeral phenomena such as stars, rain, and the phases of the moon. The title is presented in both Japanese and English, a gesture used by Ando to reflect upon the gaps between her dual cultural influences, which are often most evident in language. A practicing Buddhist, Ando works a lot with natural phenomena to express the idea of impermanence. The ephemeral qualities of stars, rain, clouds, and the phases of the moon illustrate the sentiment behind the Japanese phrase “mono no aware,” roughly translated as “the pathos of things.” Beauty fades; strength dissolves into frailty. Everything follows this rule; it is the vernacular of nature. “Something becomes more beautiful and sublime the more impermanent it is,” Ando says. “There’s a psychological shift that occurs when one recognizes the pathos of falling cherry blossoms, or the moon going through phases, or a passing cloud.”