Block · kaisho 楷書 · VB3C
Block or kaisho (楷書) styles are the most common and recognizable styles. Block styles are easily read and are noted for their angular form and their vertical and horizontal lines.
瑞気集門
zuikishūmon
Gathering of Good Omens
Auspicious air gathers at the gate: a calligrapher's wish for good fortune on a house, written at New Year or hung in a room.
by Master Eri Takase
Born and raised in Osaka, Japan, Eri Takase received the rank of Shihan, master, from two calligraphy societies, the Bokuteki-kai and Bunka-shodō, and won best-of-category awards in all-Japan national competitions. She has created calligraphy for people around the world for more than thirty years, and with your order she will be creating calligraphy for you.
In a ritual as old as calligraphy itself, Master Takase prepares the ink, meditatively rubbing the ink stick against the stone until it reaches the perfect consistency for the paper. Then, properly loading the brush with ink, she brushes your scroll. And only when the scroll is just right and meets her approval, she signs it and affixes her seal, completing your original scroll.
12 1/4" × 43" (31 × 109 cm) Japanese Scrolls
The scrolls have woven damask borders and special layered Japanese paper (washi), designed to last generations by a scroll maker in Gifu, Japan, with whom we have worked for over two decades.
Gift-Ready
Your scroll arrives boxed, with a printed insert describing the words in detail.
Sending it as a gift? Add your message at checkout and we will include it with the insert.
Ships in 1-3 days from Washington State
Your scroll is brushed when you order it and completed within 1 to 3 business days.
Your scroll ships from Master Takase's studio in Washington State. Shipping is calculated at checkout. We ship worldwide.
30-day money-back guarantee
Every order is covered by our 30-day money-back guarantee. If your scroll arrives damaged, or we made an error, we replace it or refund you in full, including shipping.
Explanation
瑞気集門 is a wish for a house: may auspicious air gather at its gate. 瑞気 is the air that comes with a good omen, and 門, the gate, stands for the house and the family behind it. Our English title, Gathering of Good Omens, takes 瑞気 in its dictionary sense, good omen, and leaves out the gate, which is the point of the wish. It is written at the New Year and hung on boards in rooms.
瑞気集門 is a calligrapher's wish for spring and the New Year, first known, in the sources read, from Ichikawa Beian 市河米庵's phrase book for the brush, 『墨場必携』, first printed in 1836. A letter manual of 1879 carries it beside its neighbors in that book, and composition textbooks from 1893, and it is found on boards hung in rooms, such as one signed in March 1891 by 宮小路康文, a priest of Dazaifu Tenmangū by the travel writer's reading of the signature and seal, which a travel sketch printed in 1915 finds over the transom of an upstairs room at an inn in Nikkō.
Learn More About These Words
We want you to be as happy with the meaning as you are with Master Takase's art. To learn more, visit Philology of 瑞気集門.
