White Space

Exploring relationship /,   Ink, chalk, graphite, and pencil

I recently went to a talk about Zen gardens, given by Professor John White - the man who designed the Zen rock garden at Three Wheels Temple in West London.  Here is a small excerpt from that talk in the form of running quotes, alongside some recent experimental works I've been making - directly inspired by a few select small stones from Three Wheels. (With permission, of course).

Close-up detail ,   Ink, graphite and small stone

"Zen Gardens create a vast sense of calmness and space." 

 Describing a specific zen garden composition in Japan: "The smallest rock in the picture is the Alpha rock and the entire garden relies on this rock."

"You can make a zen garden with even one rock (and gravel)."

Drawing/  Ink, graphite and charcoa

"When the arrangement is right, there is no sense of scattering or cluttering of rocks. Wherever you are, is where you are meant to be." 

On the famous Zen garden of Ryoanji in Kyoto: "It is all about space. The rocks are merely measuring rods, Each one no more than a space within a space..."

Studies in relationship/  Ink

I'd like to end this post with one of Professor White's haiku poems, written specifically for a Zen garden in Japan which was designed around the idea of a flowing river:

Here in the still
the river races uphill.
No wave ever moves