Friday, December 9, 2011

Fish out of Water - Exchange Student's Exhibition

I will be exhibiting some new work at an exhibition next week. It's the half yearly group exhibition held by the Exchange and Research students currently studying at Kyoto Seika University.
Last semester's exhibition was a great sucess and here's hoping we can pull it off this time around too.
It runs from Mon 12th December to Fri 16th in the 3rd floor exhibition space of the Johokan at Kyoto Seika. See the ad for it here: Fish Out Of Water - Exchange Student Exhibition
Here's the work I am thinking I will show: 

Australian King Parrot & Blackwood Wattle

豪 Australia. Linen Noren

Thursday, December 8, 2011

Rainbow Lorikeets - new works in the works

I've temporarily put aside the adorable Gang-gang cockatoos to produce a new (larger, eep!) work depicting Rainbow Lorikeets.

I did a lot of sketching and playing around with the design before starting this piece. Somehow, I always feel like I lose a lot of detail and authenticity when making the transition from sketches to full size work, so I am trying to remedy that this time. Unfortunately, I dont have a picture of the design, as its too big to take a good picture of... But here are some "in-progress" shots.

Watercolour on sketches

trying to get gestural poses. Rainbow lorikeet aren't exactly shy parrots so it's not hard to get them mid movement

My fabric hanging up, midway through applying resist paste.

to give you an idea of the scale

applying the resist paste with a cone. Gah! its time consuming...but fun somehow
section of the design. Birds in flight!
Will fill you in with more photos as it goes along. Lots and lots of ideas for new pieces in my head at the moment. I have the fabric and the tools to do it, it's just a matter of getting the designs out of my head and onto paper (and then fabric!). Very exciting.

Thursday, November 3, 2011

Gang-Gang Cockatoos - Sadly Misunderstood

I am thinking about my next works and would like to try and dye some Gang-gang Cockatoos. They are the "faunal emblem" of Canberra and feature also in the ACT Parks and Conservation Service logo.

They are such gorgeous birds to look at; the male has this fantastic red hairdo while the female is completely grey with specks of orangey-red. Whilst pretty they are also famed for their "unique" call. The ACT government website speaks fondly of its faunal emblem, stating "Their call is a distinctive sound resembling the sound of a squeaking gate." Others describe it as a squeaky cork coming out of a bottle.
Male Gang-Gang Cockatoo
Here's a little snippit I found in an 1887 London publication called "Parrots in Captivity". This is an excerpt by the snooty sounding F.G. Dutton about his lacklustre encounter with his first real Gang-gang.


"The most rasping and aggravating of all Cockatoo cries.." Ah-hah-hah! I can just see him choking on his cup of tea as he heard its cry for the first time. I think its a charming little voice that they have and SO much less aggravating than the flocks of screaming Sulfur-crested Cockatoos.

Detail of painting by Shimomura Kanzan. "Ancient Pine Trees and White Wisterias" 1921
In terms of scale, I am trying to make bigger works but its always so daunting on how to go about filling such a large space. I saw some of Shimomura Kanzan's paintings last week at the library and like his use of framing. He tends to cut off the tops and bottom of the frame and focus on a central horizontal plane. I'd love to do a long horizontal piece with a slither of gum tree showing, full of birds. My next challenge...

Wednesday, November 2, 2011

New Works! 完成したばかりの作品

Last week I finally finished two of my initial 'trial' artworks. They've been a way to get back into the swing of Katazome again but I also wanted to try out a few new techniques, including coloured resist paste and using a paper cone (づつ) to apply resist paste. Of course, they are also depicting Australian birds, in keeping with my research here in Kyoto.

First up is a linen Noren curtain dyed using Katazome technique. It shows the Kanji for Australia, "Go" 豪 and Australian flora and fauna.


「豪」'Australia'. Linen Noren. Katazome. 2011


Detail of Wattle.
Close up of my Crimson Rosella
 Second is this piece depicting a male King Parrot and Blackwood Wattle. This piece incorporates both katazome (resist paste applied with a stencil) and tzutsugaki (resiste paste applied with paper cone). I'm really happy with how this combination turned out.

King Parrot & Blackwood Wattle. Katazome and Hand-drawn resist technique on cotton. 2011
You can see the white lines which is where resist paste was applied with the cone. It gives a very different, drawing-like feel compared to stencil resist.
I have two more bird pieces *THIS* close to being finished. Once those are complete, I'd like to see what's been most sucessful in terms of technique and move on to making one or two much larger pieces.

Tuesday, November 1, 2011

Kyushu & A Japanese History Lesson 九州に行って来た

In mid October I took a little trip with my parents down to Kyushu for the first time where we spent a day in Fukuoka and two visiting Nagasaki.

My research here in Kyoto revolves around the depiction of foreign birds in Japanese art and part of that has involved looking into the history of international trade with Japan. Nagasaki has been an important link in this research as it was the location of Dejima, a manmade island off the harbour of Nagasaki where Dutch were given exclusive trading rights in the 18th century.
Going to Nagasaki I was interested to see how much of the old trading area still existed and hoped to read more about the history of the Dutch trading presence in Nagasaki.

Some beautiful karakami 唐紙 block printed wall paper in one of the rooms at the Dejima replica museum
What we found in Nagasaki was a beautiful and historically rich city. It has had brushes with Portuguese missionaries, Dutch merchants, Scottish entrepreneurs and Chinese merchants. These periods of its history are still visible in the city; Chinese style temples, Cathedrals, rows of beautiful arched stone bridges, Western style homes and buildings.

Meganebashi 眼鏡橋 The eyeglasses bridge, so called because the reflections cause the bridge to look like glasses
As for Dejima itself, there has been activity in recent years to reclaim the original Fan-shaped land of the small island which has been swallowed into the modern city of Nagasaki. Today you can visit a museum on the original site with reproduction buildings and a lot of very detailed and interesting information about what took place there. Its a little bit touristy of course but great to see.

Dejima Museum, a reconstruction project still in progress on the original site of the trading post of Dejima Island
From my research so far I knew about some of the things the Dutch had contributed to Japanese society already (coffee drinking, red bricks, mechanical clocks, beer, billiards potatoes, tomatoes, chocolate, glass making practices, medical knowledge, exotic animals…) but was surprised to learn of Scottish Entrepreneur Thomas Blake Glover’s (in Japan from 1859-1911) contributions. He was a clever business man, sinking money into whatever he saw to be profitable at the time, including shipbuilding, tea-roasting, coal-mining, beer brewing…you name it, if it was a business in Nagasaki, Glover probably had some share in it. He played a big part in establishing what are now Mitsubishi and Kirin Brewing Company and even received an Order of the Rising Sun for his contributions!

Thomas Glover certainly knew how to pick a good spot to build his house.
It's surprising to see how great were the contributions of non-japanese to the development of Japan. I don't think many Japanese people know very much about it. Maybe if they did, they wouldn't still have this tiny niggling anti-foreigner thing in the back of their collective psyche. Look how much people from other countries with other sets of knowledge and expertise can do for you country if you let them!

Anyway, it was great to see new parts of Japan, so very far removed both distance and history-wise from Kyoto. (And to go by bullet train was nice too!) Thanks Kyushu!

View over Nagasaki by night from the top of Mt Inasa. Pretty speccy!

Friday, September 30, 2011

Cut & Paste 型彫り&糊置き

This week at Kyoto Seika I've been cutting and pasting.
To be more precise, I've been cutting stencils and resist pasting them onto cotton and silk fabrics!

I came up with 3 designs to use for trial artworks.

The first one I am using to dye some noren (narrow width split curtain) for the entrance to my bedroom. The design is based on katazome works by Serizawa Keisuke (one of my katazome heroes) where he takes a singular Kanji (chinese character) and surrounds it with design elements. For example:
Serizawa Keisuke,  「夏の字」 Kanji for Summer. Katazome on tsumugi silk. 1954
Serizawa Keisuke, 「飛の字」Kanji for "Fly". Katazome on linen. circa 1961
I chose to use the Kanji which is used to represent Australia, 豪 which reads as "Go" (you can maybe translate it as 'splendid' or 'grand').

And printed with resist paste onto linen.

Here it is in it's stencil format...





Here are some images of my other two designs in progress...
Crimson Rosella

Getting ready to print the King Parrot design

Close-up of King Parrot's face after I had added some extra details...
The next step will be to apply a soybean mixture that helps stop the dyes bleeding and then I can start dyeing!

Saturday, September 24, 2011

New Katazome Hero - Nishijima Takeshi 西嶋武司

As of today,  I add another member to my group of Katazome heroes. Along with Serizawa Keisuke and Inagaki Toshijiro I add Nishijima Takeshi.

I had seen Nishijima's work before but today looking at his works again today I was blown away. He is well known for his colourful depictions of mountains.


What I really love though is his use of COLOUR! Bold blocks of colour as well as very delicate details and washed out colours and shapes.
His artworks also have a real "katazome-feel" to them. Even though they are large panel works and kind of resemble silkscreened fabric, when you look up close he has all kinds of Katazome touches. Hard to explain...


What I find interesting too, is seeing his sketches beside the resulting artworks. How does he make such bold and whimsical katazome pieces out of these wishy-washy sketches? I really struggle to make that jump; from life-like studies and sketches to something really unique and highlighting the unique technique of Katazome.

One more image and I will stop this babble.

Its Kurama! About 15 minutes north of me on the train in north Kyoto.

Monday, September 12, 2011

Parrots. インコ、音呼、鸚哥

The Japanese term for the Parrot family is inko. Nowadays it's written in katakana but it also has a few Kanji (although they are unused) 音呼、鸚哥...
Most bird names are written in katakana or hiragana alphabets now which is kind of a shame because they have these exquisite kanji. Take the following examples...
cockatoo, oumu 鸚鵡
cassowary, hikuidori 火食鳥 (this kanji literally means fire-eating bird!)
eagle, washi
flamingo, beniduru 紅鶴
Japanese nightingale, uguisu
kingfisher, kawasemi 翡翠
wren, misosazai 鷦鷯

Maybe it's just me?

I've been back into sketching in preparation for some new projects.
Crimson Rosella. Whose Kanji by the way is impossible to find but its Japanese name is akakusainko

Upside down! Rainbow lorikeet, a.k.a 五色青灰鸚哥 goshiki-seigai-inko!!

The next step is to turn my sketches into something textiles and magnificent! (the hard part!!) Will keep you updated as my design ideas progress...

Sunday, August 21, 2011

mel in japan's photostream

lying in waitocean of umbrellasthe littlest umbrella spinner
Tottori Manhole COverTottori Sakyu Manhole Coveron the way up the duneslittle ants
Looking East AmanohashidateAmanohashidatethe perfect little spotChion-ji Amanohashidate
daruma halludon actionKibune JinjaKibune Riverside DIningIdentity crisis

check out my photos of life in Kyoto and around Japan at flickr