What is the meaning of the color red in various cultures? What comes to your mind first? Red as celebratory in China, red for a 60th birthday in Japan and your second childhood, a red light meaning stop immediately or the dreaded X in red in Western cultures meaning incorrect on schoolwork?

You must be thinking, now what does all this have to do with Japanese calligraphy? In my view, a great deal. It turns out that teacher corrections to calligraphy are made using red ink though in truth the color is not a deep primary red but rather leaning toward red-orange. Japanese calligraphy teachers also may make samples for their students to copy using this same ink. Thus, this color denotes teaching materials and corrections [read more]