Michiko Uehara Author

A graduate of the École du Louvre and a doctor of Paris IV Sorbonne, Laure Schwartz-Arenales began her career at the Musée national des Arts asiatiques-Guimet and the École du Louvre, where she taught East Asian art. Her research on Japanese ancient painting, conducted since 1998 in Japan (Tohoku University - Kyoto National Museum), was awarded the Kajima Foundation for the Arts in 2007. Professor at Ochanomizu University and then at Sophia University (Tokyo), she has been director of the Baur Foundation, Museum of Far Eastern Arts in Geneva since 2018. Born in Naha, Okinawa in 1949, Michiko Uehara became familiar with Okinawan textiles through the Japan Folk Art Museum (Tokyo) when she was in college. After entering the world of textiles under the tutelage of the renowned master weaver Yoshihiro Yanagi, she learned traditional Okinawan weaving techniques from Shizuko Ôshiro and established the "Mayu-ori" workshop in 1979. Using 3-denier silk threads, the finest thread a silkworm can produce, Uehara weaves incredibly light and airy textiles, baptized "Akezuba-ori," which, in Okinawa, means a dragonfly's wing. Explorer, psychiatrist and pioneer of clean technologies, Bertrand Piccard is the author of two first aeronautical round-the-world flights in a balloon and a solar plane. President of the Solar Impulse Foundation, this United Nations Environment Ambassador uses his fame to serve progress, sustainability and quality of life, three themes that are reflected in his concept of "qualitative economy".