The Art of the Circle

 

Sato is more than just a shop for European-Japanese living culture. Since the 1990s, Sato has also been a meeting place for art, culture, craftsmanship, design and music. Guests have included Muji's art director Kenya Hara, ink painter Tohun Kobayashi, and musician Nik Bärtsch.

It was in this tradition that Sato had the privilege of giving Sanae Sakamoto a stage from 18 September 2025 to 21 March 2026 – a Japanese artist who, well into her eighties, remains active every single day. Her work is varied, uplifting, spiritual and at times quietly playful. Every brushstroke carries its own story.

The Circle

Sakamoto is particularly fascinated by a visually simple motif: the circle. This recurring element of Zen painting represents emptiness, but also infinity and the art of accepting everything. For the artist, the circle also embodies a contradiction, as she explained in an interview with SRF: it is both the simplest and most difficult motif at the same time.

The challenge lies in painting the perfect circle in a single brushstroke – the supreme discipline of Zen painting. In doing so, the mind must be as empty as the circle itself. “But emptying the mind is one of the most difficult exercises,” says Sanae Sakamoto.

The Right Moment

A ritual helps her with this creative challenge: before painting, she meditates until she senses the right moment to place the brush on the handmade Japanese paper. “I never know beforehand whether it will succeed,” she admits. Sometimes this creates an incredibly beautiful circle that she could never repeat in quite the same way again. This moment is pure joy.

Sanae Sakamoto has held numerous solo exhibitions both domestically and abroad. Her works are represented in significant collections such as the Würth Art Collection. In 1995, she became known to a wider public when her calligraphy adorned the tail fin of a Swissair aircraft.

The Exhibition

For the exhibition Tao and Zen, Sato presented over seventy works by Sanae Sakamoto – classical calligraphies, contemporary ink paintings and traditional hanging scrolls. The exhibition offered several opportunities to encounter Sakamoto in person and to watch her craft at close quarters. Her work embodies what has always guided Sato: an understanding of aesthetics that finds its greatest strength in reduction and stillness. 

The exhibition Tao and Zen by Sanae Sakamoto was held from 18 September 2025 to 21 March 2026 at Sato, Ausstellungsstrasse 39, Zurich.

 
Tags : Art, Culture, Event

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