COMMENTS ABOUT SACHIKO FURUI
Sachiko, All I can say is that I enjoy your
work so much. It contains Balance and Symmetry.
It definitely shows your talent and the field
that you have trained.
(Arthur Ross)
Thank you once again for the masterpiece
(hanging in a place of honor over the doorway
to the sun porch!), which glows with life
and color, among a few other cherished mementoes
of Asian origin in this house.
(Barbara Carleton)
Sachiko, Itfs beautiful and it fits beautifully!
I am delighted with it!
(Carlos Grana)
I think your work is exclusive with beautiful
coloring. It fits almost any setting. As
a matter of fact, it gives people homey atmosphere.
I am very satisfied with your work that I
bought and gave to my best friend as a Christmas
present.
(Galina Bertelsen)
When I first saw this painting, I gasped.
My reaction was immediate and visceral because
I was on the mountain in the storm. Everything
dark was there to make fearful, the fury
and chaos in nature, the cliff, the abyss,
imminent death and destruction, surging water
and trembling rocks, a difficult, tumultuous
scene. Yet also I notice, that quietly and
surely, there shine small things which give
me a hope, a hint of color, a ray of light,
flecks of gold in the blackness.
Yes, I am on the mountainside and there is
much road to walk, but I am given courage
and support. In the midst of my worst depressions
or in moments of bad news, I look at this
painting. It feeds my soul, kicks out the
creeping paralysis, and encourages my action,
persistence, and faith. I transcend the urge
to cringe and hide to walk on, hopeful and
brave.
Later, Sachiko told me she had created this
painting in few very intense days, just at
the time of the Kobe Earthquake. She did
not get the news until a few days later of
the total devastation in the city that she
lived and the death of her art teacher Waichi
Tsudaka (1912-1995).
(Toni Treadway)
My father's family has roots in Newark, Delaware.
The "George Read" house is
there. Sachiko's beautiful woodblock print
connects me to my family history.
(Cathe Read)
1985, May 24th
The Mainichi Newspaper
Art critics
Satoru Yamamura
Sachiko Furui's solo exhibition at Amano
Gallery is enjoyable enough for the presentation
of her work made of colorfully painted cloth
in the show window which was reconstructed
from the original wide space of this gallery
specially for this exhibition. The hanging
painted art looks like a curtain or a Japanese
Kimono sash. The paintings of its background
are also painted freely by water acrylic.
Sometimes they remind us of the flower drawings
and therefore I dare to say her work is one
of Japanese New Wave Paintings filled with
a gentle feeling only that young female has.
She lives in Osaka. The exhibition will be
by June 1 st.
1995,November 1st
Salem Evening News
Japanese traditions at West End Gallery
Koto, the Japanese traditional string instrument,
will be played to open the last show of the
season at the West End Gallery. The show
opens tomorrow from 7 to 9 pm and will end
on November 19th.
The show futures Rowley artist Sachiko Furui
who views America with a special eye. After
coming to America in 1985, she began a series
of woodcuts based upon the experience of
Hiroshige Ando. Furui has started her 100
views of America depicting, so far, New England,
Delaware and New York.
1990, November 13th
Plain Dealer
Helen Cullinan
Woodblock prints enhance the city
"We want a series of prints that will
show the positive energy of Cleveland"
That was the only instruction given to the
creators of "Six views of Cleveland"
prints in the classic Japanese woodblock
print technique, now on view at the Mitzie
Verne Collection in John Carroll University.
The project was in the expert hands of painter
Sachiko Furui and her own master print maker.
Furui did the sketches that were transformed
into print. Sachiko, living in Boston now,
exhibited in the "Cross Cultural Currents
in Contemporary Japanese Art" series
at the Verne Collection last spring. "Eight
Viws of New England" prints in that
show inspired the gallery to commission a
series that would celebrate Cleveland.
It's obvious where the real inspiration lies.
Woodblock technique produced such Ukiyoe
masterworks as Hokusai's "36 Views of
Mt. Fuji," Yoshitoshi's"100 Aspects
of the Moon" and Hiroshige's "53
Stations of the Tokaido Road" and "Eight
Views of Lake Biwa." Hand in hand with
woodblock technique went the emphasis on
numbers, in the organizational mode of Asian
thinking. "Six Views of Cleveland"
is in that tradition.
"We started at daylight," Verne
Collection vice president Michael Verne said
of his whirlwind two day tour of Cleveland
landmarks with Furui last May. Visiting about
a dozen locations from Chagrin Falls to the
Gold Coast, Furui sketched her chosen subjects
on the spot, making color notes in Japanese.
Furui never had seen Cleveland and had no
attachments. Verne's attitude was intentionally
stand off, letting her pick what she wanted.
He was constantly amazed when she stopped
dead and zeroed in on a scene like a photographer
knowing when to click the shutter.
Architectural monuments were not Furui's
interest. Nevertheless, she was captivated
by the Epworth-Euclid Methodist Church which
she portrays with the flavor of a pagoda
in Kyoto. She frames it in blossomed cherry
branches from across the Lagoon, making the
surroundings most important. It's one of
four views in the series in a vertical format
11 by 8 inches.
Furui's sloping Little Italy scene obscures
the Holy Rosary Church in power lines and
parked cars; the one thing missing is people,
but the hour was early. In her Flats scene,
one of two prints in vertical 5.25 by 4.25
format, a black lift bridge dominates to
the horizontal view, with letting to the
right across the river on the side of a building
clearly spelling out Fagan's.
A very blue brook bubbles through woods in
the "Metroparks" print. "Palace
Theater" does the renovators proud in
its depiction of plush red velvet seats and
loges under glittering chandeliers and curtained
arches. Finally, "Tower City" shows
and black Terminal Tower at night, flanked
by the Power House smokestacks.
The prints are issued in edition of 100.
Using up to 12 color blocks for each image.
While representational in essence, they take
liberties with a palette that depicts Cleveland
as if seen on a halcyon day when the Cuyahoga
River looks like the Caribbean. The series
is both technically superb and upbeat in
feeling.