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CG Kamo’s Remarks

At the Opening Ceremony of the Calligraphy Exhibition by Ryuho Hamano at the Japanese Culture Center of Hawaii 

July 10, 2010

Good morning. How many of you can speak Japanese? O.K. I will go in Japanese for the first a couple of minutes.

浜野龍峰先生、ホノルルへようこそお出で下さいました。先程来、先生とお話しをする機会がございましたが、我々は、殆ど同郷であるということが分かりました。先生は豊橋、私は浜松の出身で浜名湖を挟んで東西に分かれますが、親近感を覚えました。

浜野先生は中国で修業された経験をお持ちで、これまでもスペインを始めとし外国での活動も豊富だと伺っております。今回、浜野先生がハワイ官約移民１２５周年を記念しての現代書の作品を創作され、本日ホノルルにて展示会を開催されることは慶びに耐えません。先生の作品群は創意に溢れ、見る者を圧倒します。官約移民１０６０名の名前を書き連ねた現代書に加え、「元年者」の氏名を印刻したハンコを１００以上押した掛け軸等見ごたえのある作品が展示されています。ハワイ在住の多くの日系の方々に是非ご覧頂きたいと思います。

Well, folks, I said that I had a chance to talk with our Brush Master Hamano in the gallery prior to this opening event. With my pleasant surprise he and I came from almost the same region in Japan. His is Toyohashi and mine is Hamamatsu. There’s Lake Hamana that separates the two. East to the lake is Hamamatsu and west Toyohashi. It is strange that we have met for the first time in Hawaii, rather than Lake Hamana. Hawaii is sure to claim the place where east meets west.

Mr. Hamano is a master calligrapher and has been active not only in Japan but overseas, including Spain and he studied and further refined his technique in this art form in China. This time we are so lucky that he created his works of art for the 125 anniversary of the Kanyaku Imin from Japan to Hawaii. His works are amazing. You see 1060 names of Kanyaku Imin written with brush strokes in a white canvass. Another must see item is the scroll which contains more than 100 seals representing the full name of Gannenmono, the first Japanese immigrants who sailed from Japan to Hawaii back in 1868.

I hope that Americans of Japanese Ancestry in Hawaii would visit the exhibition in numbers and feel something out of it. I am sure that this exhibition makes them very proud of their ancestors and history.

Enjoy the exhibition.

Thank you.