Chigirie or Paper Painting with torn Japanese paper

atsu- : thick
-gami(-kami) : paper
harusame : spring rain
itajime : clamped between pieces of wood
kami(gami) : paper
muji- : plain-color
mura- : ombre, shading
nagare- : stream
unryu : dragon-in-cloud
usu- : thin
washi : japanese paper
-zome : dyed

INQUIRY

Chigirie or Paper painting

Take a look at the following Chigirie works.

Usually subjects of Chigirie include popular flowers and peaceful landscapes.

gladiolus

.cherry blossom

What kind of painting is Chigirie?

Chigirie is a kind of collage painted/made with Washi paper, you could say, but not ordinary ones as you imagine

by the word 'collage'. Dyed Washi Paper is used to paint/make Chigirie as a substitute for water color painting

or oil painting.

Washi paper mainly used for Chigirie is soft and absorbent paper - suited to be dyed to create

both sharp and soft, hard and feathery patterns, and hues and colors. Often it happens that the delicate patterns,

hues or subtle colors of the dyed paper, lead painters to unexpected ideas or images to be used in paintings.

What is the meaning of Chigirie?

The Japanese word 'chigirie' is a combination of two basic words 'chigiri' and '-e'.

'Chigiri' is the nominative form of the verb 'chigiru' which means 'to tear' and '-e' is an art work or picture

painted by tearing Washi papers.

Because of this method of tearing paper with fingers, it brings characteristic appearance

of softness and tenderness.

Of course cutting with knife or scissors is not prohibited at all, especially when your finger tips

cannot tear pieces that are too thin or too small, or even when you want pieces to be cut with sharp edge.

Let's see another Chigirie example:

Here is a deckle-edged greeting card
with Chigirie picture .

Click the image for larger one.

Brief history of Washi Paper

The paper-making was invented in ancient China. In the beginning, paper was made of bamboo

or straw with short fibers. After they introduced the paper-making skills into Japan

in the 6th century, these paper-making materials were replaced by paper mulberry with longer fiber.

In comparison with "western paper" (less than 2mm), these fibers used as material for Washi Paper

are much longer (2-15mm).

In addition, because of the characteristic process of manual paper making originally developed

in Japan, Washi Paper can be produced very thin and very strong and elastic with fibers that are

well mixed and combined.

Today, Washi Paper is used for art of calligraphy, paper craft and art such as Chigirie, interior decoration

and various other purposes.

How to compose Chigirie ?

If you'd like to know how to to do Chigirie,click the arrow below.