Japanese Embassy in Saudi Arabia and Saudi Arabian Society for Culture and Arts (SASCA) held a calligraphy demonstration event – collaboration of Japanese and Arabic calligraphies at Riyadh Branch Office of SASCA.
For Japanese calligraphy, Ms. Oson Ito, who practices it more than half a century, showed energetic performance of the lettering and impressed the attendees beyond the language barrier. For Saudi side, Mr. Nasser Al-Maymoon represented Arabic calligraphy and visitors carefully observed his delicate but clear trait at every stroke. The two artists paid respect to each other, exchanging their works, and they made collaborations to write a same word such as friendship and horse in their own ways, representing the cultural affinity. The attendees appreciated the harmony between the great artistries of their proud traditional cultures.
Ms. Oson Ito told: once she felt that calligraphy has not been adequately appreciated like other visual arts such as painting. She strongly believes that the lettering of a meaningful word has an intrinsic value which other visual arts cannot share. She determined to devote herself for cultural exchange through the art, and here, in Riyadh, she tastes the great joy to find the bond and affinity between Japan and Saudi Arabia through her devotion, calligraphy.
Embassy of Japan in Saudi Arabia has promoted cultural exchange between the two countries, and on the recent occasion of Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s visit to Japan, it exchanged Memorandum of Understanding with the Ministry of Culture and Information for enhancing the cultural cooperation between two countries along Saudi Vision 2030.