Miya Ando discusses her Cloud series of artworks (on view in the Buddhist Art galleries), from their genesis — arising from her earlier Hamon paintings (referring to a cloud-like pattern on the edge of a sword) — to the overarching concept of mono no aware. She will delve into the notion of clouds as a natural clock and timekeeper that demarcate fleeting moments and articulate the human condition.

Presented by the Friends of Asian Arts and Cultures and the Friends of Modern and Contemporary Art, this lecture is free and open to the public.

About the Artist: In the work of Miya Ando, nature serves as form and metaphor for expressing the concepts of impermanence and interdependence. Growing up between two cultures, geographies, and languages — Northern California and Japan — Ando makes sculpture, paintings, drawings, and installations that engage duality by merging the manmade with the organic, the material with the immaterial, and Eastern and Western culture. Ando’s work is part of many public collections, including the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Detroit Institute of Arts, and the Noguchi Museum, among others. Her work has been exhibited at the Crystal Bridges Museum of Art and the Queens Museum of Art, and she is the recipient of many awards, including the Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant. Ando holds a bachelor’s degree in East Asian Studies from the University of California, Berkeley, studied East Asian Studies at Yale University and apprenticed with a Master Metalsmith in Japan. Her site-specific commission Flower Atlas Calendar premiered at the Winter Garden in Brookfield Place, New York, NY in 2023.