Tides – and other images of water’s eternal flow
The tool that characterizes Hiroko’s free-flowing, almost calligraphic ink drawings is a large, traditional Japanese ink brush made of horsehair. It weighs several kilograms even before being dipped in the liquid – heavy enough that it takes both hands to hold it. The artist has been working with the same round-tipped brush for sixty years, although she also owns newer ones of this type as well as various round and flat brushes. In use for so many years, this brush has adapted to Hiroko’s working style – she is ingrained within it. The tip protrudes sharply, with a conical shape that has developed only gradually. If you consider the size of this brush, more than the length of a forearm, and visualize the amount of ink it must hold to create Hiroko’s large-format paintings, then one thing becomes starkly clear: The very act of painting is an extremely physical process, one that is both physically and mentally demanding for the artist.
The painting surface – whether canvas or paper – is laid out on the floor. Immersed in concentration, the artist moves across the floor, swinging the brush with both hands. She rehearses these movements many times beforehand and creates preliminary works in the same format, although these are then discarded after the final version is completed. Time is not manifest as an economic principle here, nor is it a criterion of this art, which is based more on absorption and meditative repetition. Indeed, the very foundation of traditional ink painting is constant practice until a character is mastered and internalized – a highly focused way of working, for which the artist must be completely present within herself. Spectators would disrupt and distract from the process. Any kind of audience, the artist explains[1], would make it more of an exercise or a performance.[2]
It was only through complete mastery of calligraphy that the Japanese avant-garde was able to revolutionize the traditional notion of “sho” and transform it into something new. Like Master Okabe Sōfū, under whom Hiroko studied in Tokyo from 1970 to 1973, and Morita Shiryū, under whom she further deepened her knowledge in 1982, Hiroko has likewise transcended the boundaries of traditional calligraphy and transformed it into a form of expressive abstract painting in which the act of painting itself becomes the subject. The emphasis is no longer on legible characters, but rather on a free form of expression that defies norms and conventions, yet respectfully and confidently reveals its roots in East Asian tradition. To this day, Hiroko has remained committed to a painting style reduced in color and gesture. The brush is only ever dipped into the ink once to absorb the liquid, which then forms a “motif” on the surface as the outcome of a single, fluid gesture that follows a quiet choreography.
With this painting technique, the artist must precisely gauge both the amount of ink and water on the brush and the pressure she needs to apply. She must take care to maintain control at all times. For a sho artist, the brush is like an extension to the arm, allowing the artist to create their own individual style or manner of painting. With power and focus – and a corresponding breathing technique – Hiroko guides the heavy brush mostly from left to right, moving around the canvas like a dancer. Her painting follows clear rules that an onlooker may not discern, but which define the unique expression of her art. Gravity seems to be overcome, and the works radiate a clarity and harmony made possible only by great inner composure – mastery of technique as well as self-control.
Without dipping the brush again, Hiroko builds up the underlying lines while the ink is still wet. The brush has to hold the liquid well and release it onto the painting surface only gradually; cognizant of this, the artist allows gaps to merge, fills in areas, and permits small pools of ink that dry with a glossy sheen. When the brush no longer releases any more ink, the painting process comes to an end. Satin and glossy areas alternate in the painting, with the surfaces appearing ever different depending on the angle of the light.
Although this process has been rehearsed multiple times beforehand, not everything here is predictable. Once the artist is in the flow of movement, she must continue and accept the marks that result from it. Time and again, drops, smudges, and scattered splatters accompany the brushstrokes, leading toward the main shape. It is precisely these inevitable byproducts of her powerful movements that allow her to leave behind the boundaries of once-learned conventions. For all her intense concentration, these accidental traces of her work are an expression of the freedom and spontaneity of Hiroko’s actions. They allow us to discern her movements and often initiate a dialogue between the viewer and the artwork. At the same time, they are signs of a palpable directness and a vitality full of poetry that can arise only from the artist’s union – through her brush – with the painting surface. Hiroko’s state of mind and her mindful presence in the moment of creation are conveyed to the work in a kind of dialogue through tempo, rhythm, and fervor.
Hiroko’s painting is a sensory experience; the creative process is tangible, yet something magical and indefinable clings to the works, drawing in the viewer. Although the cultural roots of this art are visible, the artist creates something new, with a physical presence that suggests an almost sculptural concept. Her expansive, powerful lines have a sculptural effect and a sense of volume that might perhaps be traced back to her studies in sculpture during her periods of study in Japan.[3] “I always see a physical form within it,”[4] the artist explains.
Although she has repeatedly created series in which canvases were first primed with midnight blue, green, or dark red gouache and then marked with ink or acrylic, the most prominent works are those in which the black paint on a white background creates the greatest possible contrast. The surrounding space is particularly important for the impact of the painting. This is no empty space, but should be viewed more as an expansion into which the mark made – which usually touches one or more edges – can spread, allowing its structure to unfold.
Unlike acrylic paint, ink is a remarkable medium for painting, as its appearance can manifest in countless variations. Since it is highly pigmented with tiny soot particles and mixed with resin as a binder, ink is easy to apply and can produce a result ranging from opaque, brilliant, or flowing to translucent and in every shade from deep to grayish black. Depending on the angle of the light, the black may appear brown, green, or violet. An artist practicing traditional East Asian ink painting is expected to be able to create at least as rich a range of tones with black ink as with a full palette of colorful pigments.
Yet Hiroko is by no means dogmatic in her approach. Depending on the project, she works with different painting media and combines them. Particularly in her large-format works – some of which span two or three canvases, such as Moonlight A (2021) – she combines acrylic with ink, or, in the series Arbre de vie (2017), ink and pigment on a canvas primed with color. Drawing on decades of experience, she understands her colors and their flow characteristics and knows how to apply them appropriately in each case.
The titles Hiroko gives her works have for many years repeatedly referenced water and its movements.[5] Water accompanies humans in its most diverse states – as rain, a river, or the sea – and is hugely significant to Hiroko both as an element and as a place of yearning: “It can be beautiful, gentle, or threatening. Time and again, I find myself moved by water.”[6]
Hiroko’s current series of paintings, Tides, sees the artist employing a new approach: The work is no longer created with a single brushstroke and a single impulse of movement, but – much like the ebb and flow of the tides – through two successive movements. There is a very light, gray streak of paint that the artist applies with a flat brush. Hours or days later, she initiates a dialogue as she responds to this initial mark with a dominant black gesture, which she executes sometimes as a parallel movement and sometimes as a contrary one. The powerful black suggests the all-encompassing flood, in which the ebb phase lingers only as a memory.
In these works, the otherwise stark contrast between black and white is softened; shades of gray create gentler transitions. The flow of the highly diluted paint emphasizes the phenomenon of constant change. This step allows Hiroko’s artistic language to expand into a new dimension – one in which she again leaves her traditional roots behind.
Petra Oelschlägel
[1] In conversation with the author in July 2026
[2] Such as that at the Strundequelle natural spring in Herrenstrunden as part of the Bergisch Gladbach Kultursommer, Oct. 17, 2021
[3] While she was a student at the Cologne University of Art and Design, under Karl Burgeff and Daniel Spoerri 1975–81
[4] See footnote 1
[5] For example, Strömung (Flow, 2003), Wasserspur (Water trail, 2006), Kleine Welle (Little wave, 2007), Confluence (2012)
[6] See footnote 1
Text from the catalogue: HIROKO - when black turns to blue, 2026
