"In a Japanese Garden"
By Lafcadio Hearn

"No effort to create an impossible or pure ideal landscape is made in the Japanese Garden.  Its artistic purpose is to copy faithfully the veritable landscape, and to convey the real impression that a real landscape communicates.  It is therefore at once a picture and a poem; perhaps even more a poem than a picture.  For as nature's scenery, in its varying aspects, affects us with sensations of joy or solemnity, of grimness or of sweetness, of force or of peace, so must the true reflection of it in the labor of the landscape gardener create not merely an impression of beauty, but a mood in the soul."

Excerpted from:
The Atlantic Monthly
Volume 70, Issue 417
July 1892

 

 

Mayor of Matsue, Japan

Matsuura Masataka, Mayor of Matsue, Japan, recently wrote to Dr. Strong to thank the Japanese  Garden Society for its "hard work and dedication over the past few years". He added " We hope that many people will visit this garden and gain an insight into Japanese culture. It is our wish that this garden will act as a building bridge between Matsue City and New Orleans, as well as between Japan and the United States of America".  Dr. Strong and the entire JGSNO are so thankful for the tremendous support Matsue has shown for this project.