Born 1912, Toyooka, Japan

Education:

           Morita had an influential and innovative role in the avant-garde calligraphic movement of his time. He was one of five calligraphers to form the Bokujin-Kai or “Ink Human Society” in 1952, which sought a common universal language that was centered on spontaneous gestural abstraction while remaining responsive to the history of East Asian Calligraphy. In his own works, he endeavored to reconceptualize calligraphy as a contemporary artistic medium while seeking to rise above the barriers between cultures so as to generate a new international art. During the 1960s, he embarked on an extended trip to North America and Europe presenting lectures and demonstrations.

Selected Exhibitions:

2002    Writepainting: Marks in a Japanese Vein, Museum of Fine Arts, Gifu, Japan
1994    Japanese Art After 1945: Scream Against the Sky, Yokohama Museum of Art,
            Yokohama, Japan/ Guggenheim SoHo, New York
1992    Shiryu Morita and Bokubi, Hyogo Prefectural Museum of Modern Art, Kobe, Japan
1992    Calligraphy and Painting: The Passionate Age: 1945-1969, O Art Museum, Tokyo
1986    Morita Shiryu, Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art, Kyoto, Japan