Palms Pressed Together in Prayer

Fujinuma Noboru pursued bamboo art as a second career, after quitting his job as a quality control manager for Nikon at the age of thirty and apprenticing himself to Yagisawa Keizo. Despite starting relatively late in life for someone working in traditional crafts, his talent soon became apparent as his baskets were accepted into the most prestigious exhibitions and he gained membership into the Japan Craft Arts Association. The color of this basket evokes the appearance of susudake, “smoked bamboo” recycled from the rafters of old farmhouses, where ash and soot from the hearth over time turned the bamboo a warm reddish-brown color. The scarcity of actual susudake has led contemporary bamboo artists such as Fujinuma to master staining techniques that re-create this prized effect.