BORN: Tokyo, Japan, 1952
EDUCATION: B. A. from The University of California, Berkeley, 1974
M. A. from The Institute of Buddhist Studies in Berkeley, 1980

PIECES HELD IN THE PRIVATE COLLECTIONS OF:

Senator Daniel k. Inouye
Senator Pete Wilson
Congressman Robert Matsui
Congressman Norman Mineta
State Assembly Speaker Willie Brown

Dennis has shunned Western avenues of art education, and has attempted to seek his art training in the form of master-disciple relationships, as are prevalent in the Japanese culture and the Buddhist tradition.
Dennis Shin Fujimoto acknowledges his parents as two of the most influential people in his life; not only for their parental nurturing, but also as true teachers. His mother, Madame Suiyo Fujimoto, is a well-respected instructor of Japanese culture. She specializes in Ocha, the Tea Ceremony, and in the Ohara School of Ikebana where she holds the title of Grand Master. His father, the late Reverend Hogen Fujimoto, was a Buddhist Priest of the Pure Land Tradition. Through his parents’ professional endeavors, he can trace their influence on his own views of art and the philosophies behind his work. "Both flower arrangement and the tea ceremony have close developmental ties to Zen Buddhism. Naturalness and depth in simplicity are ideas prevalent in Buddhism, Zen in particular."

ON BUDDHISM: "Buddhism encourages its followers to strip away the frivolous; to recognize and move away from the relative world of material gain and personal pleasure, toward an awakening to the absolute. The Buddhist life is to walk this path from relative to absolute and to help others along the way."

ON THE CREATIVE PROCESS: "I look upon the creative process as a form of meditation. The end sculpture is a reflection on the human struggle toward enlightenment.."

ON HIS SCULPTURES: "It is my hope that my sculptures have a settling presence and exude a meditative calm. In this busy life, perhaps they can serve as a sign, a reminder, to stop and breathe."

Owner of Wood & Stone, principal designer of the Jigokumon Collection.