Official site of artist Mayumi Oda
Books for Sale and Coming in 2018
Merciful Sea
45 Years of Serigraphs, Mayumi Oda
This book is a must-have resource for Mayumi Oda collectors. A catalog raisonne of Mayumi Oda's serigraphs, spanning a period of 45 years from 1968 through 2011. Published in conjunction with the exhibition at the Robyn Buntin of Honolulu gallery of fine art. Includes a personal retrospective commentary from Mayumi written in 1985 and updated in 2011. Mayumi shares her thoughts behind works of individual series including the Ocean, Goddess, Garden, Diptych series, and many more.
Published by Robyn Buntin of Honolulu, May 2012.
Dimensions: 11" x 8.5", 108 pages, softcover, full color throughout.
Sarasvatis Gift | Pre-Release
Sarasvati’s Gift is a memoir, wildly colorful artist’s retrospective, dharma teaching, ode to the divine feminine, and manifesto to a peaceful future composed by impassioned global activist and artist recognized as Japan’s Matisse, Mayumi Oda.
Born and raised in wartime Japan and living in Princeton, San Francisco, and Hawai'i since 1966, Mayumi displays the transformative nature of art on every page, showcasing thirty thangkas that envelop us in images of the divine that are both prayerfully meditative and filled with fire. Mayumi’s work expresses the singular mission to stop the proliferation of nuclear energy and armaments. Art and commentary, autobiographical stories, and writings encouraging transformation and peace grace every page of this compelling volume.
“I was four years old when atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki,” Mayumi writes. “The horror of seeing blackened, ash-covered bodies and the shadow images of people imprinted on concrete affected me deeply. I could hear the screams of survivors crying for help. These paintings are the work of my heart—a way for me to share my love and remind the world of the importance of life.”
Mayumi Oda is now 75 years old. She lives in Hawai'i, painting, growing organic food, and practicing random kindness and senseless acts of beauty. Sarasvati’s Gift is dedicated to the work of women warriors and offered to inspire young people and move peoples’ hearts.
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Random Kindness and Senseless Acts of Beauty
Anne Herbert, Margaret Paloma Pavel & Mayumi Oda
In 1982 Anne Herbert wrote "Practice Random Kindness and Senseless Acts of Beauty." This beautiful precept began to appear everywhere–on garden gates, on bumper stickers and posters and in books.
Today, she has joined with Margaret Pavel to expand her statement into a powerful message for our times, and for all ages.
Mayumi Oda's art merges with the text as if they were created together. For Random Kindness and Senseless Acts of Beauty, she derives her style from picture scrolls entitled Chojugiga: Frolicking Animals, said to have been drawn during the 12th century Heian Period in Japan.
Published by Volcano Press, 1993.
Dimensions: 7-3/4" x 6-3/4", 22 pages, softcover, full color throughout.
Divine Gardens
Mayumi Oda & The San Francisco Zen Center
Mayumi Oda’s internationally-recognized artwork plays with traditional Japanese and Buddhist images, refiguring them as celebrations of the feminine and the natural world. Where most traditional Buddhist iconography features male figures, Oda introduces female “Goddesses” that seem to jump off the page, imbued with the vibrancy of Oda’s color and line.
Originally from Japan, Oda settled in Muir Beach, California in the 1970s and began practicing and painting at Green Gulch Farm Zen Center, which Oda calls her “California Buddha Field.” Divine Gardens pairs Oda’s artwork with essays by her fellow practitioners, for whom Oda’s artwork has been a constant companion.
Suitable for study by art students or for display on a coffee table, Divine Gardens captures the essence of Mayumi Oda’s art and life as a Zen practitioner. The forty-five full-color works of art and twenty-four essays contained in the collection are a joyful celebration of her work and the community forged through the years at the San Francisco Zen Center.
Published by Parallax Press, November 2017.
Dimensions: 9" x 12", 112 pages, hardcover, full color throughout.