As part of our week of Spring Madness, we wanted to showcase Ryuijie’s stunning Color Ice Forms. The rich saturated color, the texture of the ice and plant materials, and macro vision all captures the best part of spring. In these blooms we feel as if we have lifted our faces into the sun, their warmth and joy feeding our need to get out of the winter blues.

Join us in the gallery on Saturday April 26th at 2pm

for a conversation with Ryuijie about his work.

 

 

About Color Ice Forms –

Ten years ago I began working on a body of photographs I call “Ice Forms.”

The subject matter is botanicals frozen in blocks of ice, photographed in black and white with a large format camera. and printed on 20×24 silver gelatin paper. I have recently expanded the series to include color. In both black and white and color, the ice is as important as the flowers it encases, providing an element of the unexpected and unpredictable. This element can be likened to the Japanese principle of wabi sabi—beauty in nature in all its imperfections.

 

 

About Ryuijie –

Ryuijie was born in Otaru, Japan in 1950. As a young child he moved with his family to the US and subsequently lived in many places, from Hawaii to New Hampshire, and again in Japan, until his father retired from the military. Throughout his childhood, Ryuijie showed a serious inclination to the arts. This interest began to materialize during his own military service.

 

Ryuijie has steadfastly pursued his own photographic vision for over thirty years, and has acquired a reputation for his exquisite platinum/palladium prints, in addition to his traditional black and white work. An exceptionally prolific artist, Ryuijie’s career has been highlighted by a multitude of exhibitions. His work has appeared in View Camera, Photovision, Camera and Darkroom, Black&White, Lenswork, and Focus magazines. He has published three books, Ryuijie: Photographs, Time and Place, and Fragments of Time, along with smaller catalogs.

Works by Ryuijie can be found in private and public collections word wide including the Monterey Museum of Art, the Getty in Los Angeles, and the Center for Creative Photography in Tucson Arizona.

To see more of this beautiful portfolio, stop into the gallery, or see it online. Please RSVP for his Artist Talk on April 26th.