site.btaArtist Ani Ivanova: Bulgaria Hosts World's Biggest Non-Japanese Group of Kiri-e Artists

Bulgaria has the largest non-Japanese group of kiri-e artists in the whole world, kiri-artists Ani Ivanova told BTA's Elina Kyurkchieva. Ivanova is the organizer and curator of the exhibition "Natural Harmony", which presents works of the traditional Japanese papercutting art at Pleven's Iliya Beshkov Art Gallery.

This is the first kiri-e exhibition in Pleven. Exhibited until October 19 are over 70 works by 27 authors, 18 of whom Japanese. 

Ivanova said that kiri-e is a Japanese art that dates back to the 7th century. It was imported from China and used to make the patterns for decorating kimonos and other textile works. After the Second World War in Japan, it began to be used as a technique. "Just as some artists work in watercolor and acrylic paints, some may make their works in kiri-e. 'Kiri' in Japanese means cut, and 'e' is the suffix that is put for picture, i.e. cut paintings," Ivanova explained.

She was the first artist in Bulgaria to start cutting colour kiri-e paintings. 

"I have been involved in organizing events related to Japanese culture for many years. The biggest of them is in Sofia - the Bulgarian Aniventure Comic Com, which gathers over 25,000 people every year. We always have a traditional Japanese area where we show our fans various demonstrations, workshops and more. This is how I came across the first Kiri-e workshop in Bulgaria in 2012. That's when I met Rina Papadopoulou, a Bulgarian living in Poland. She is a self-taught kiri-e master and does workshops in Poland and Italy. She came and did a workshop in Bulgaria, on home soil. Since then, a few of us got passionate and continued to cut, and in the following years we started doing small and then bigger joint exhibitions and gathering more fans of this art," Ivanova said.

The small workshops grew into the Kiri-e Academy, where students built on what they had already learned. According to Ivanova, these are people of different ages for whom kiri-e is a hobby that brings them great pleasure. 

"I can now safely say that kiri-e has become popular in Bulgaria. We have fans, even a few collectors who buy paintings. When it comes to Japanese art, most people think of origami, ikebana, haiku, calligraphy, but in Bulgaria kiri-e is always mentioned alongside them. This is interesting because in Europe this art is almost unknown. It's not very well known outside Japan either. I can say that Bulgaria has the largest non-Japanese group of kiri-e artists in the whole world," Ivanova noted.

For herself, she adds that Japanese culture has always been a very big part of her life. She is even currently enrolled in a Master's degree programme in Japanese Studies in order to be a Japanese scholar as well as an art historian and artist. 

"Kiri-e brought me even closer to Japan. Thanks to it, I went to Japan for the first time in 2020 and participated in a show. It's called 'Who Wants to Go to Japan' and it invites people who are into some Japanese art to participate. The invited participant goes to Japan where he meets a master of that art. I was the first participant with kiri-e. Right during the COVID pandemic I was in Japan and we were filming an episode. I met three very good Japanese kiri-e masters. The episode was very popular in Japan and we even did another one about what happened to me after I came back to Bulgaria. They filmed a third episode where one of the authors I met in Japan came to Bulgaria. We also did an exhibition in Sofia with works by the three artists I met in Japan," Ivanova told BTA.