I am passionate about the sheer beauty, visual, tactile and experiential of handmade Japanese papers known as Washi. I also appreciate them for their gentle ecological footprint, for their beautiful history, and for the expertise, skill, time and patience required to pull by hand fine, even, transparent yet strong sheets of paper.

I am also passionate about supporting this time-honoured tradition which is on the brink of extinction. My works on Washi are my way of paying honour and homage to the papers and the artists that produce them.

They are an excellent choice for my works, both the scrolls and the “journals/books”, which are for me meditations and spiritual practices, as this method of paper making is descended from the need of Buddhist monks to have a vehicle on which to record their suttas and mantras and other spiritual writing and images. Mostly I use them because doing so makes my soul sing.

Mary Louise