Works-in-Progress Session: Saihōji’s Moss Garden

Presented by Sunhui Choi, Ph.D. Student, University of California, Los Angeles

Hosted by the Early Modern Research Group

Online event via Zoom
To register, please visit: https://ucla.zoom.us/meeting/register/pLNOlEHQQviw5U6V0-k6-g

Saihōji in Kyoto, Japan, is famous for its moss-covered garden and is thus referred to as Kokedera, meaning “the moss temple.” What if, however, the design of the moss garden was not intended when it was originally established? If so, how and why has Saihōji’s garden become the moss garden that it is today? Based on the perspectives of critical plant studies and ecocriticism, this work-in-progress session examines how the often-overlooked presence of moss deterritorializes the boundaries of design and inverts the center and periphery of the landscape, directing it in unpredictable ways during early modern Japan and continuing to do so in the present day.

Sunhui Choi is a Ph.D. student in the Department of Art History at UCLA, studying the intersection of art, space, and ecology. In her doctoral research, she examines visualized scientific knowledge and ecological sensibility within built environments, particularly during the Edo period (1603–1868). Her previous works include a thesis on the imagery of birds and flowers as a material transitional trajectory between medieval and early modern East Asia.

Image: Saihōji’s garden, Kyoto, Japan. Photo by Sunhui Choi.