I went to the Japanese Garden in March and April this year. Having spring visitors is a great excuse to head to the garden — not that it takes more than an open morning and an idle thought to get me there. Spring photos always feel inadequate to the experience of immersion into so many shades of green. Here are a few samples:

In April, I was able to see the installation by artist-in-residence Rui Sasaki. Sasaki gathered plant materials during two seasonal visits to the Japanese Garden, and then placed the material between panes of glass and fused the glass in a kiln. The resulting patterns left by the combustion and the ash were fossil-like in their delicacy and sense of absence. She also created a work of hung strips of glass on a hillside in the garden, called “Shelter from the Rain.” There’s more about her process and the exhibition on the Japanese Garden’s web site: Subtle Intimacy: Here and There.