About the Artist

Follow on Instagram @KenCannata for glimpses into inspired living, info on "higher" education, as well as incense and tea artistry.  Ultimately, this is about the incense and its opportunity - so there is some effort to not get in between people and their experience.   

Ken's journey into incense began in a larger context in high school through Chinese martial arts, and then at a local Buddhist temple in Niagara Falls where he volunteered for a few years.  It wasn't until being in an immersive undergraduate program in Chinese Studies at DRBU that he was so moved by the classic scents like agarwood and sandalwood.  You can read the alumni spotlight on the DRBU website here. At the same time, most of the incense was quite toxic and caused allergic reactions - experiences which seeded this current mission to make incenses that are pure and clean - speaking for themselves.

After many years of travel and working in the artisan tea industry in both Hawaii and Taiwan, and after completing a M.A. in Buddhist Classics at DRBU in 2018, Ken was invited to begin the deep dive into incense with the well known innovator, incense artisan KyaraZen in Singapore.

Now he is endeavoring to explore and deliver to everyone a new frontier of inspired aromatics.  Through studying and integrating the KyaraZen system, he makes incenses available that are an integration of East Asian skills and standards - with both Western & Eastern ingredients.  Truly the first of their kind, these incenses are made in home studio with sincerity and excellent craftsmanship.  It is without question a remarkable fortune to be learning from KyaraZen - so he moves forward with much gratitude and strives to maintain a balanced attitude of confidence and humility.

For Ken, incense making is a way of life, offering limitless opportunities to learn and grow.  Yi-Xin Craft Incense is his endeavor to put the incense and the aromatic experience as the main focus of attention, and let the beautiful stories and poetic expressions be revealed in the scents themselves - "Smelling is knowing."