May 2008

The Miasa-Omachi Artists

Hirotoshi Itoh

Seven artists from Mendocino's sister city, Miasa-Omachi in Nagano Prefecture in Japan, exhibit their unique creations, including silver jewelry, humorous sculptures, woodcarvings, textiles, calligraphy and more.

Mendocino Art Center founder Bill Zacha and artist Toshi Yoshida formalized the sister city relationship in 1980. In 1992 Miasa and Mendocino started annual youth exchanges that have continued throughout the years. The Miasa exhibit coincides with this year's exchange, May 23-28.

Keiko Takei, a well known calligraphy artist, who is showing her artwork in the Miasa exhibit, will do a calligraphy demonstration followed by a question and answer session, Friday, May 9, at 4:00 p.m., in the Art Center's Stevenson Studio. The Mendocino Art Center was recently the recipient of a beautiful calligraphy gift from Takei entitled "Torch Light" or "The Light from the Flame." She created the piece especially for the Art Center during a demonstration for the Mendocino Sister City exchange group.