kris moon

kris moon [栗子 - chestnut child]

kris moon, co-founder & past president of  the Association for International Renku (AIR) is an artist, poet, journal keeper, teacher & mom. kris, full of a myriad of interests, has long been fascinated by the multi-talents of the early haijin.

kris studied art & education in Boston in the 60′s and was influential in the early days of the Kaji Aso Studio. Kaji gave her a set of R.H. Blyth’s books as a going away present when she went to Japan in 1972. She has been writing poetry for 50 years, haiku & senryu for 40 years, renku for over 30 years & tanka for about 15 years. She also loves & writes other forms of poetry.

kris’s renku activities intensified in the 1990′s when she was at the center of major events the haiku and renku worlds in Japan & internationally. Her activities included work with the Haiku Society of America, Haiku International Association, and Haiku North America. This was as renku seeds were taking root on all fronts and Renku North America (RNA) in 1992 was a pivotal undertaking.

kris is also Regional Director for Japan of IAPT, International Academy for Poetry Therapy. In 2010 she started Chestnut Cottage. Morning Glory Studio, Moonflower Gallery invites artists and poets from all over the world to stay at Chestnut Cottage.

kris lives with her youngest daughter Karen in Kiyokawa Village in Kanagawa, Prefecture, Japan. As detailed above, kris had a career as an artist before marrying wandering haiku & renku poet Tadashi Kondo in 1979. Daughters Karen & Anna are also very talented prolific artists and their brother Jorge has an eye for cameras and a thumb for twittering.

Artist daughter Anna in Venice, Ca. wrote this about her mom:

she prefers
poetry
for every word
she says is
worthy