Swastika 1906

Ogino Issui made this drawing called 'Swastika' sometime around the turn of the century using ink and paper. I love how flat it is, almost like a print, yet you can sense the slow, deliberate movements of the artist’s hand. He’s marked the surface with pictograms or symbols in chalky white, some legible, some mysterious, and then overlaid it with a solid yin yang and a swastika. It’s almost like he’s trying to decode something, layering meaning upon meaning. I bet he was super focused when he made this, trying to work something out. Maybe he was thinking about the relationship between different signs and belief systems, about the hidden connections between things we think of as opposites, like good and evil. And, of course, the swastika is a very charged symbol to be using. It makes me think about how artists build on each other's work, borrowing and reinterpreting ideas across time. It’s a good reminder that meaning is never fixed, that it’s always changing and up for grabs.