Senior Center – Sunday May 5th at 10 AM—12:50 PM in Classroom B

by Lisa Rigge and Dave Wright

Dave Wright, an emeritus professor, was past president of the Yuki Teiki Haiku Society of the U.S. and Canada. He also spent a year in Japan on sabbatical studying and writing haiku in English. Lisa Rigge served as President of the Pleasanton Art League and as artist-in-residence at the KALA Art Institute in Berkeley. In 2016, she traversed the path, as Wright did, that Matsuo Basho walked in the 17th Century during which he created “The Narrow Road to the Deep North. Rigge and Wright collaborated to exhibit silk scroll of Photo-Haiku of their journey in Japan and will present a photo-haiku workshop.

This workshop will offer discussion and the opportunity to create haiku of your own to pair with photo images. All haiku will be written in English. For critiques, haiku can be presented anonymously. The goal of the workshop is to prepare you to create photo-haiku of your own. Photo-haiku is an art form that you can practice, regardless of the amount of knowledge of photography or haiku which you have. Photo Haiku is a relatively new form in Japanese Tradition. While Basho and Buson, two of the most famous haiku masters, often did paintings to enhance the haiku they wrote, we now have the camera to capture images that a haiku may comment upon or enhance. We can also write a haiku and then seek out a photo to enhance it. You will learn:

•  What make several lines into a haiku and what is its relationship to human affairs and to nature.
•  What is a good photo for photo-haiku. Why some photos “pop” and some don’t: composition, simplicity, leading lines, complementary colors, point of greatest interest, etc.
•  How a short poem can enhance the richness of a good photograph, not just describing what is in the photo but adding dimension to what we see—sounds, scents, feelings, tactile responses, and resonances or insights beyond the photo imagery.
•  How collaboration can enhance the process. It can be a two person or one person activity.
•  Methods of presentation for photo-haiku—silk scrolls, framed presentations as gifts for friends or family, seasonal greeting cards, facebook or instagram postings, etc.

The workshop enrollment is limited to 15 persons and the cost is $15, strictly for the costs of materials including a book on haiku, photos and a list of resources for both haiku and photography.