Artists
Ewa Rosiek-Buszko
Marta Bożyk
Małgorzata Malwina Niespodziewana

Photography
Takaaki Otsuka

‘Washi no fushigi. The Mystery of Paper’ is an exhibition aiming to introduce the viewers to the magical world of paper art. The idea of such an exhibition was conceived in 2003, during my art residency at Mino, Japan. All the artists participating in this show are Cracovian women, and all three of us are fortunate to have experienced the art of creating unique handmade papers both in Mino and in Duszniki Zdrój. Drawing on centuries of experience, with great respect for tradition, we continue to fathom the mysteries of paper. In its variety of forms, it is a material of great significance to our work. The exhibition illustrates its  extraordinary possibilities and potential, as well as the joy of unceasing artistic exploration.

It is our great pleasure to invite you into our world of paper.

 
Mino is the picturesque place where the artists fathomed the mysteries of washi paper some fifteen years ago. Kraków, too, is a city filled with magic charm. The Manggha Museum of Japanese Art and Technology is a place of importance to art, one cultivating the tradition of exchange between the cultures of Poland and Japan, two lands so distant, and yet so close to each other. 2019 is the jubilee year of the centenary of the initiation of Polish-Japanese relations. There are, therefore, several reasons to hold the exhibition ‘Washi no fushigi. The Mystery of Paper’, not least among them the art of making washi paper, which was entered in the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2014. The fact that paper is also revered in our country is demonstrated by the existence, since 1968, of the Museum of Papermaking in Duszniki Zdrój. In 2017 it opened Poland’s first paper art gallery, which will be the second venue of this exhibition. Subsequently, the show ‘Washi no fushigi. The Mystery of Paper’ is to be taken over by the Mino Washi Museum. What is the mystery that the exhibition sets out to reveal to us? In their conversations with me, all three artists spoke of light as the element integrating their artistic expression, and then light is a positive symbol and a mystery in itself.