Memento Mori: Solo Exhibition by Yuri Shimojo

Not long after March 11, 2011, the day of the earthquake and tsunami, Shimojo was in New York City, far from her ancestral homeland. She heard reports on the news of Sakura (Japanese cherry trees) blossoming amid the debris in Tōhoku, the epicenter of the earthquake. The disaster caused the deaths of nearly 16,000 people, with thousands more injured and missing. Shimojo started painting Sakura petals in an attempt to process her pain. This repetitive act became a form of ritual, akin to Buddhist monks counting each prayer bead. According to the artist, “By the time I stopped counting how many petals I had painted, I started to see each petal as a life. I conversed with each. I became them.”

Painted with Japanese ink on Indian Khadi handmade paper, each work from Memento Mori follows the overall form of a circle. Sakura led to the completion of four more paintings, all created using a mandala-like sphere, and each different in their colors, intentions, and themes.