Peace in the Garden

"Water cleanses everything. It goes all the way back to the beginning. There was no East, no West, no North, no South. It was all Mother Earth. Just one thing. We lived on earth. We honored just one body, one mind. That's the way it must be if we want peace in the future."

"We must get together. The way we will save our lives is to be just one mind.
That is my thought and spirit for the garden."

"In the garden, as in any garden, you can find some kind of human peace.
That is the way I built this garden."

"The garden is a personal statement that peace will come."

The Oriental Garden in Austin, Texas was conceived and constructed by Isamu Taniguchi in 1968-9. At the time the Vietnam War was raging in Asia and riots were roiling the streets in America. Mr. Taniguchi, however, had an enduring vision that peace would come and the Oriental Gardens is his contribution to a time when we really will all learn to "live together."
It is appropriate that he chose gardening as his art form, because a garden takes decades and centuries to fully form. It may take that long for his dream to come true.
Mr. Taniguchi immigrated to California from Japan in 1915, in the midst of another war. He was a farmer, and a successful one. When WWII began, he, along with 120,000 other Japanese-Americans, were driven from their land and forced into relocation camps. Mr. Taniguchi was place in Crystal City, Texas. He liked the land and stayed after the war to raise flowers, vegetables and cotton.
His son Alan was educated at the University of Texas, Austin and when Mr. Taniguchi retired he moved to Austin and offered to construct a garden on three acres of land at Zilker Botanical Gardens. It borders the Colorado River and has a stunning view of downtown Austin.
Later he assisted Lady Bird Johnson in her beautification efforts around Town Lake.

In 1987, PHIT created a documentary about this extraordinary man, his extraordinary garden and his even more extraordinary vision of peace. The documentary is being remastered and will be available for sale by June of 2006. There will also be available a tour of Oriental gardens in Texas.