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RUMI

The mystic writings of the Persian poet known as Rumi (1207-1273) are generally considered to be the supreme expression of Sufism, the mystical trend in Islamic thought and culture. Rumi was born in 1207 in the oasis of Balkh, in what is now northern Afghanistan, to a Persian-speaking family.

Japan in Vienna

It is believed that Japonisme has its beginnings in the workshop of a printer in Paris, when, in the 1856, the painter and printmaker Félix Braquemond (1833-1914) came across, by chance, examples of Japanese manga (kacho-ga) by Hokusai that had been used for packaging porcelain in the 1850s. In the last half of the 19th century, when Japan had reopened to the West and the great civilizations encountered each other, the time was…

FUKUDA
Fukuda Kodojin (1865-1944) was among a handful of scholar-artists who continued the tradition of literati painting (nanga) after 1900. Kodojin’s painting style is characterised by bizarre mountain forms rendered in vivid colour or monochromatic ink that often include a solitary scholar enjoying the expansive beauty of nature. In addition to painting, Kodojin was also an accomplished poet and calligrapher with deep knowledge of Chinese literature. In the late 1920s, a group of prominent admirers that included the then-prime minister of Japan…