Ilya Gaponov: The Garden
The Garden explores the tea ceremony as a way of experiencing space and time through the landscape and symbolism of the persimmon tree, grounded in East Asian cultural traditions and the idea of mono no aware, an awareness of the beauty of change and transience.
Through ritual, gesture, and attention, the tea ceremony is understood not as a linear sequence, but as a cyclical experience connected to natural rhythms, where time is perceived as a repeating pattern of nature.
Admission is free.
Staying for a tea experience after the opening? Our full tea menu will be available at the usual open day prices.
A Musician will play soft tunes through the evening.
Opening: 7:00 PMClosing: 9:30
7:00 PM > Introduction to exhibition with a welcome drink
8:00 PM > Main hall for a tea session + live music performance.
The Garden is a space where ritual, image, and environment converge. It brings together the tea ceremony and a landscape centered on a persimmon tree, where art unfolds in direct relation to its surroundings. Gesture, perception, and spatial experience move within a shared rhythm of attention.
The persimmon tree carries cultural memory across East Asia. Originating in China and later spreading to Japan and Korea, it is associated with seasonal cycles, agricultural labor, and everyday life. In Chinese culture, it symbolizes harmony and prosperity, while in Japan it is linked to autumn, transience, and the concept of mono no aware, an awareness of the fleeting nature of things and the beauty found in impermanence.
Within the tea house, these meanings are embodied through experience. The tea ceremony becomes a practice of attention, slowness, and precise gesture, reflecting time not as linear but cyclical, like the changing seasons. The persimmon landscape extends this idea into visual form.
Overall, the exhibition creates a unified field of attention in which the viewer enters a state of presence. Tea, space, image, and natural rhythm merge into a cyclical experience of time.
About the Artist
Ilya Gaponov (b. 1981, Kemerovo) is a Russian artist currently living and working in Budapest. He works across painting, installation, object-based art, video, and performance. He graduated from the Kemerovo Art College (2001) and the Stieglitz State Academy of Art and Design in St. Petersburg (2007). He also studied at the PRO ARTE Institute and at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris.
He has participated in exhibitions and biennials in Russia and internationally. His works are included in the collections of the State Tretyakov Gallery, the State Russian Museum, the Erarta Museum of Contemporary Art, as well as private collections in Europe and the United States.
The details.
No event?
Just come.
Drop in for à la carte teas or book a Tea Journey any Friday, Saturday or Sunday between 12:00 and 18:00. No ticket needed — just reserve your seat.
Open Fri–Sun · 12:00–18:00 · Vörösmarty utca 19/A · Budapest