An Art Gallery Providing Lessons! –at the Matsumoto Shoeido Antique Store that Holds a Calligraphy Class is a True Ideal for Adult Tastes
2024.08.29
In the area of Yaesu, Nihonbashi, and Kyobashi, you can find many adults who know genuineness in various fields ranging from food, clothing, and housing to hobbies and jobs. This is an illustrated essay expressing the “taste” of those towns, created by an illustrator Chie Sasaki. The fifth episode is about my participation in a calligraphy class held at Matsumoto Shoeido, which deals in Japanese hanging scrolls and other art from the Heian period (794–1185) to the present day.
Calligraphy is part of familiar traditional Japanese culture that many people have experienced in childhood through classes and enrichment lessons.
If adults want to start learning something, it is of great advantage to them in mental terms to try something that they have experienced before. But when I actually experienced calligraphy anew, I realized it has outstanding effects in addition to improved handwriting!
I heard that Mr. Yuasa had learned calligraphy at Daito Bunka University and had taught it as a part-time teacher at a senior high school.
And one day, when Matsumoto Shoeido in Kyoto opened a new branch in Nihonbashi, he was asked to become a staff member of this branch of the art gallery.
Later, he was appointed the calligraphy class teacher.
He said that he was able to deliver the details and fascination of drawings and calligraphy works with poems or lyrics, called “San,” through his job at the art gallery and so was welcomed by the customers.
Then, we started the lesson of calligraphy with a cock, which might have been in the garden of Jakuchu’s house, watching over us!
Mr. Yuasa says that learning calligraphy has been expanding, so it is easy to find a class to learn it anywhere in Japan and that anyone can restart to learn it anytime if they want to.
So, he hopes that more people will enjoy calligraphy and make use of it in their daily lives.
Actually, many pupils of all ages from children to elderly persons attend the class and learn calligraphy together here.
I found that improvement in handwriging through calligraphy lessons was just a by-product, and calligraphy could provide time that would be needed for those who work hard at something, such as jobs,child-rearing, or study![1]
Grinding an inkstick
Handwriting
I realized that these simple actions might provide an ideal for adult tastes during the 90-minute lesson.
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Matsumoto Shoeido Calligraphy Class Nihonbashi
Address: Sakamoto Bldg. 3F, 3-8-7 Nihonbashi, Chuo-ku, Tokyo
Tel：080-9608-7598
Official website：
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Adults’ Intellectuality and Hospitality Learned from the Traditional Japanese Culture – “the Art of Tea Ceremony”
Academy for Sophisticated Adult’s Taste
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A Festival as the Soul of the Japanese - First Mikoshi Experience in My Life during the Sanno-Matsuri Festival, One of the Three Major Festivals of Japan [Advance Preparation Part ]
Academy for Sophisticated Adult’s Taste
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Touring Tokyo Art & Antiques, an annual spring event to see, touch, buy, and become familiar with art
Mademoiselle Yulia and Yorimichi Art
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A Festival as the Soul of the Japanese - First Mikoshi Experience in My Life during the Sanno-Matsuri Festival, One of the Three Major Festivals of Japan[Shitamachi Rengo Togyo Part]
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Chie Sasaki is popular for her illustrated essays with the uniquely loose touch and sharp viewpoints, working extensively in magazines, advertising, and Web media. She likes travelling enough to publish an all-illustration guide to Taiwan titled LOVE Tainan~Taiwan no Kyoto de Tabeasobi ~ (LOVE Tainan ~ foods and activities in the Kyoto-like area of Taiwan~) (Shodensha Publishing Co., Ltd.) in 2017. Other writings of hers include Kozure Souru (Travel to Seoul with My Children) and Jiji Tsure Meido no Miyagetabi in Pari (A trip with elderly men in Paris as a golden memory for them) (both from Shodensha Publishing Co., Ltd.)
Instagram：chie_sasa
