Teachers from Ikebana International-Youth Educational Project demonstrated the art of flower arrangement to Japanese language students on Jan. 22.

Ikebana is a disciplined art form in which nature and humanity are brought together.

Japanese teacher Yoko Harada said, “I have never learned anything about ikebana before and when I received information about this opportunity, I wrote an application last year, but the Academy was not selected. This year, we received an invitation from Ikebana International so we were very fortunate to have this opportunity. I wanted my students to learn the basic history of Ikebana, the concept of ikebana as a Japanese art and why ikebana developed in Japan.”

Students had an opportunity to create their own flower arrangements of ikebana, based on a scalene triangle outlined by three main points, usually symbolizing heaven, Earth and man or the sun, moon and Earth.

Junior Wei Yi Huang said, “I learned more about the Japanese culture and the importance of balance in the four concepts of mass, line, space and color. Our teachers also taught us Ten-Chi-Jin which signifies the importance of harmony. They also mentioned that the samurai used to practice ikebana a long time ago and how they think that more people should learn ikebana so that we may have more harmony in our society.”

Junior Yunzhen Peng said, “I enjoyed the ikebana demonstration because we were actually able to experience a hands-on activity about Japanese culture. It was very fun because we created many colorful combinations and also because it was very relaxing to learn how to make it.”