The Japanese Meteorological Agency can usually be counted on to nail their annual cherry blossom forecasts, and they were spot on again this year, too. The local TV station led off their dinner-hour news program earlier this week with an agency update reporting that the buds on the area’s cherries would start opening on the 25th. A walk in the park around the prefectural offices this morning confirmed that the trees had indeed begun to flower Over the next month, the media will continue to provide daily updates on the sakura zensen, or cherry blossom front, as the location of those areas with newly blooming trees moves gradually up the archipelago until the last of the flowers emerge for the spring in Hokkaido at the end of April.
It’s no surprise that the Japanese should get it right when the subject is cherries. Hanami, or parties for viewing cherry blossoms, first became popular among the aristocracy during the Heian period (8th to 12th centuries), and reached an extreme with Toyotomi Hideyoshi in the late 16th century. The custom spread among the common people during the Edo period, and it’s still a part of the annual cycle of events today. Everyone’s been to a hanami at least once.
Spend some time in Japan, and you’ll soon understand the reason; a park with cherry blossoms in full bloom is stunning in its loveliness. Is there any other country in which such a commonplace act as a picnic in the park is infused with such natural poetry? Yes, some at a hanami may drink too much and sing too loudly, but isn’t the purpose of a party to eat, drink, and be merry? Besides, the revelry seldom gets out of hand, and the Japanese have a knack for tuning out the neighbors when the occasion demands.
One reason the cherries have such a hold on the popular imagination is that their peak period of beauty is so brief. The entire season for the flowers lasts little longer than three weeks from beginning to end. For the Japanese, the cherries are a symbol of the impermanence of life, and they frequently use the word hakanai (short-lived, fleeting, transitory) to describe both the flowers and the evanescence of existence. In addition, the verb chiru, meaning to be scattered or fall, is used to describe the scattering of the cherry petals. In some instances, the same word also is used to mean death. Accounts of the Second World War often speak of the many young lives that “chiru” on the battlefield.
These ephemeral qualities are one facet of a fascinating contrast between the informal national flowers of Japan and Korea. While it may not occupy the same place in the Korean imagination as cherries do in Japan, the Rose of Sharon (mugunghwa in Korean, mukuge in Japanese) serves as a similar symbol. The cherry, as we’ve seen, is a fragile blossom that quickly reaches its peak and just as quickly disappears. The Rose of Sharon is the opposite. A hardy plant, it continues to bloom from June to October through the hottest months of summer, and each plant produces several thousand blossoms a year.
The Koreans are said to find this hardiness appealing. One adjective that often crops up in Japanese descriptions of Koreans is shibutoi—tenacious and enduring. Tenacity is an essential survival trait when you’re the runt in a neighborhood that includes the Chinese, Russians, Japanese, and Mongolians.
Korean references to the national flower date as far back as the Silla Kingdom, (57 BC-935 AD), which metaphorically referred to itself as Mugunghwa Country. The South Korean national anthem, Aegukga, has the line, “Mugunghwa filled three thousand li of splendid rivers and mountains…” (A li is roughly 2.44 miles, making this lyric an echo of the phrase about cherries in the old Japanese song Sakura, Sakura: “miwatasu kagiri”, or as far as the eyes can see.) One of the trains in the national railway is called the Mugunghwa. And in a good-humored touch, the Koreans use pictures of the mugunghwa flower rather than stars to rate hotels.
There is a theory in Japan that the cherry is so popular because the Japanese prefer flowers that are falling rather than flowers that are blooming. That would explain their love for the cherry—even a relatively mild breeze is enough to send a spray of petals floating like so much pink snow. When the cherry motif is used on television, such as a backdrop for the performance of a song, the blossoms are often shown fluttering to the ground, rather than in a static scene. The attraction for the Japanese is the brevity of the beauty, which contains an intrinsic poignancy and tension.
The meaning of the underlying Chinese characters for mugunghwa, however, is quite the opposite. The characters are 無窮, which is pronounced mukyu in Japanese. It means endless or eternal.
Saturday, February 16, 2008
Japanese Bra
Japanese Bra -title may seem to you similar to something like "Japanese Cat". Cats and pets have no similar nationality to people. So how can brassieres have? We could take a manufacturing standpoint, but it wouldn't be more interesting than talk about DVD players made in Japan.
Bra, by all it's appeal and spirit, is clearly a product from the west. Japan didn't know bra until Japanese started wearing western clothes, a change which happened sometimes during Meiji era. With wafuku, bras or any other western underwear wasn't used. With kimono, women wore only thin layer of cloth, which served the purpose of underwear that time. Under yukata, sometimes women didn't wear anything at all.
Japanese bras are said to be more decorative, more cute, and have sense of visual delight. They have tiny hearts to them, embroidiery and lace.
It is interesting that although Japan is the famous design country, the creator of latest trends that are copied by French and Italian designers, Japanese women are fairly shy to shop the cutting edge bloomy color bras you see in the shops.
It is interesting question, what kind of bra does Japanese women actually use in daily life.
In general, japanese bras seem to be more cute than sexy, more warm than cold. More childish than independent.
Compare a flower of sakura to a red rose. Sakura's scent is just a hint, an unobtrusive thought, while rose's scent is overwhelming, and something that seeks attention. Same goes with Japanese bra's color. Many Japanese women like simple white or pastel colors (or colour of sakura flower, why not). Some like black (like the branch of sakura tree). But it is rare to see heavy red, or yellow or other strong colors.
Some women find japanese bras to be more comfortable to the skin than western ones.
Japanese like to be graceful and same goes with their other clothing style. Japanese women feel they want to conform to the social concencus, the air around them. For same reason, Japanese women don't seem to wear strong parfume. This is also visible in the mainstream bra market. In contrary, Japan is one of the rare countries where it is not out of the ordinary to see women wearing fishnet stockings while shopping.
I remember reading an article of a foreign man who was overwhelmed to notice her girlfriend, a 35 years old office lady, wore a mickey mouse bra. He said it was like children's clothing, while his girlfriend saw nothing unordinary about it. Why not.
In Europe it is nothing out of the ordinary to see a couple going to lingerie shop. In Japan, I suspect people shop online. There are plenty of the shops, but mostly women go there alone.
Japan is different in the sense of bras as well. I wish Japan will keep into the various differences in the future as well.
Bra, by all it's appeal and spirit, is clearly a product from the west. Japan didn't know bra until Japanese started wearing western clothes, a change which happened sometimes during Meiji era. With wafuku, bras or any other western underwear wasn't used. With kimono, women wore only thin layer of cloth, which served the purpose of underwear that time. Under yukata, sometimes women didn't wear anything at all.
Japanese bras are said to be more decorative, more cute, and have sense of visual delight. They have tiny hearts to them, embroidiery and lace.
It is interesting that although Japan is the famous design country, the creator of latest trends that are copied by French and Italian designers, Japanese women are fairly shy to shop the cutting edge bloomy color bras you see in the shops.
It is interesting question, what kind of bra does Japanese women actually use in daily life.
In general, japanese bras seem to be more cute than sexy, more warm than cold. More childish than independent.
Compare a flower of sakura to a red rose. Sakura's scent is just a hint, an unobtrusive thought, while rose's scent is overwhelming, and something that seeks attention. Same goes with Japanese bra's color. Many Japanese women like simple white or pastel colors (or colour of sakura flower, why not). Some like black (like the branch of sakura tree). But it is rare to see heavy red, or yellow or other strong colors.
Some women find japanese bras to be more comfortable to the skin than western ones.
Japanese like to be graceful and same goes with their other clothing style. Japanese women feel they want to conform to the social concencus, the air around them. For same reason, Japanese women don't seem to wear strong parfume. This is also visible in the mainstream bra market. In contrary, Japan is one of the rare countries where it is not out of the ordinary to see women wearing fishnet stockings while shopping.
I remember reading an article of a foreign man who was overwhelmed to notice her girlfriend, a 35 years old office lady, wore a mickey mouse bra. He said it was like children's clothing, while his girlfriend saw nothing unordinary about it. Why not.
In Europe it is nothing out of the ordinary to see a couple going to lingerie shop. In Japan, I suspect people shop online. There are plenty of the shops, but mostly women go there alone.
Japan is different in the sense of bras as well. I wish Japan will keep into the various differences in the future as well.
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
History of japanese art
Jōmon art
The first settlers of Japan, the Jōmon people (c 11000?–c 300 BC), named for the cord markings that decorated the surfaces of their clay vessels, were nomadic hunter-gatherers who later practiced organized farming and built cities with population of hundreds if not thousands. They built simple houses of wood and thatch set into shallow earthen pits to provide warmth from the soil. They crafted lavishly decorated pottery storage vessels, clay figurines called dogu, and crystal jewels.
Yayoi art
The next wave of immigrants was the Yayoi people, named for the district in Tokyo where remnants of their settlements first were found. These people, arriving in Japan about 350 BC, brought their knowledge of wetland rice cultivation, the manufacture of copper weapons and bronze bells (dōtaku), and wheel-thrown, kiln-fired ceramics.
Kofun art
The third stage in Japanese prehistory, the Kofun, or Tumulus, period (c AD 250–552), represents a modification of Yayoi culture, attributable either to internal development or external force. In this period, diverse groups of people formed political alliances and coalesced into a nation. Typical artifacts are bronze mirrors, symbols of political alliances, and clay sculptures called haniwa which were erected outside tombs.
Asuka and Nara art
During the Asuka and Nara periods, so named because the seat of Japanese government was located in the Asuka Valley from 552 to 710 and in the city of Nara until 784, the first significant invasion by Asian continental culture took place in Japan.
The transmission of Buddhism provided the initial impetus for contacts between China, Korea and Japan. The Japanese recognized the facets of Chinese culture that could profitably be incorporated into their own: a system for converting ideas and sounds into writing; historiography; complex theories of government, such as an effective bureaucracy; and, most important for the arts, new technologies, new building techniques, more advanced methods of casting in bronze, and new techniques and media for painting.
Throughout the 7th and 8th centuries, however, the major focus in contacts between Japan and the Asian continent was the development of Buddhism. Not all scholars agree on the significant dates and the appropriate names to apply to various time periods between 552, the official date of the introduction of Buddhism into Japan, and 784, when the Japanese capital was transferred from Nara. The most common designations are the Suiko period, 552–645; the Hakuho period, 645–710, and the Tenpyō period, 710–784.
The earliest Japanese sculptures of the Buddha are dated to the 6th and 7th century. They ultimately derive from the 1st-3rd century CE Greco-Buddhist art of Gandhara, characterized by flowing dress patterns and realistic rendering, on which Chinese and Korean artistic traits were superimposed.[1] They illustrate the terminal point of the Silk Road transmission of Art during the first few centuries of our era. Other examples can be found in the development of the iconography of the Japanese Fujin Wind God,[2] the Nio guardians,[3] and the near-Classical floral patterns in temple decorations.[4]
The earliest Buddhist structures still extant in Japan, and the oldest wooden buildings in the Far East are found at the Hōryū-ji to the southwest of Nara. First built in the early 7th century as the private temple of Crown Prince Shotoku, it consists of 41 independent buildings. The most important ones, the main worship hall, or Kondo (Golden Hall), and Goju-no-to (Five-story Pagoda), stand in the center of an open area surrounded by a roofed cloister. The Kondo, in the style of Chinese worship halls, is a two-story structure of post-and-beam construction, capped by an irimoya, or hipped-gabled roof of ceramic tiles.
Inside the Kondo, on a large rectangular platform, are some of the most important sculptures of the period. The central image is a Shaka Trinity (623), the historical Buddha flanked by two bodhisattvas, sculpture cast in bronze by the sculptor Tori Busshi (flourished early 7th century) in homage to the recently deceased Prince Shotoku. At the four corners of the platform are the Guardian Kings of the Four Directions, carved in wood around 650. Also housed at Hōryū-ji is the Tamamushi Shrine, a wooden replica of a Kondo, which is set on a high wooden base that is decorated with figural paintings executed in a medium of mineral pigments mixed with lacquer.
Temple building in the 8th century was focused around the Tōdai-ji in Nara. Constructed as the headquarters for a network of temples in each of the provinces, the Tōdaiji is the most ambitious religious complex erected in the early centuries of Buddhist worship in Japan. Appropriately, the 16.2-m (53-ft) Buddha (completed 752) enshrined in the main Buddha hall, or Daibutsuden, is a Rushana Buddha, the figure that represents the essence of Buddhahood, just as the Tōdaiji represented the center for Imperially sponsored Buddhism and its dissemination throughout Japan. Only a few fragments of the original statue survive, and the present hall and central Buddha are reconstructions from the Edo period.
Clustered around the Daibutsuden on a gently sloping hillside are a number of secondary halls: the Hokkedo (Lotus Sutra Hall), with its principal image, the Fukukenjaku Kannon (the most popular bodhisattva), crafted of dry lacquer (cloth dipped in lacquer and shaped over a wooden armature); the Kaidanin (Ordination Hall) with its magnificent clay statues of the Four Guardian Kings; and the storehouse, called the Shosoin. This last structure is of great importance as an art-historical cache, because in it are stored the utensils that were used in the temple's dedication ceremony in 752, the eye-opening ritual for the Rushana image, as well as government documents and many secular objects owned by the Imperial family.
Heian art
In 794 the capital of Japan was officially transferred to Heian-kyo (present-day Kyoto), where it remained until 1868. The term Heian period refers to the years between 794 and 1185, when the Kamakura shogunate was established at the end of the Genpei War. The period is further divided into the early Heian and the late Heian, or Fujiwara era, the pivotal date being 894, the year imperial embassies to China were officially discontinued.
Early Heian art: In reaction to the growing wealth and power of organized Buddhism in Nara, the priest Kūkai (best known by his posthumous title Kōbō Daishi, 774-835) journeyed to China to study Shingon, a form of Vajrayana Buddhism, which he introduced into Japan in 806. At the core of Shingon worship are mandalas, diagrams of the spiritual universe, which then began to influence temple design. Japanese Buddhist architecture also adopted the stupa, originally an Indian architectural form, in its Chinese-style pagoda.
The temples erected for this new sect were built in the mountains, far away from the Court and the laity in the capital. The irregular topography of these sites forced Japanese architects to rethink the problems of temple construction, and in so doing to choose more indigenous elements of design. Cypress-bark roofs replaced those of ceramic tile, wood planks were used instead of earthen floors, and a separate worship area for the laity was added in front of the main sanctuary.
The temple that best reflects the spirit of early Heian Shingon temples is the Muro-ji (early 9th century), set deep in a stand of cypress trees on a mountain southeast of Nara. The wooden image (also early 9th c.) of Shakyamuni, the "historic" Buddha, enshrined in a secondary building at the Muro-ji, is typical of the early Heian sculpture, with its ponderous body, covered by thick drapery folds carved in the hompa-shiki (rolling-wave) style, and its austere, withdrawn facial expression.
Fujiwara art: In the Fujiwara period, Pure Land Buddhism, which offered easy salvation through belief in Amida (the Buddha of the Western Paradise), became popular. This period is named after the Fujiwara family, then the most powerful in the country, who ruled as regents for the Emperor, becoming, in effect, civil dictators. Concurrently, the Kyoto nobility developed a society devoted to elegant aesthetic pursuits. So secure and beautiful was their world that they could not conceive of Paradise as being much different. They created a new form of Buddha hall, the Amida hall, which blends the secular with the religious, and houses one or more Buddha images within a structure resembling the mansions of the nobility.
The Ho-o-do (Phoenix Hall, completed 1053) of the Byodoin, a temple in Uji to the southeast of Kyoto, is the exemplar of Fujiwara Amida halls. It consists of a main rectangular structure flanked by two L-shaped wing corridors and a tail corridor, set at the edge of a large artificial pond. Inside, a single golden image of Amida (c. 1053) is installed on a high platform. The Amida sculpture was executed by Jocho, who used a new canon of proportions and a new technique (yosegi), in which multiple pieces of wood are carved out like shells and joined from the inside. Applied to the walls of the hall are small relief carvings of celestials, the host believed to have accompanied Amida when he descended from the Western Paradise to gather the souls of believers at the moment of death and transport them in lotus blossoms to Paradise. Raigo paintings on the wooden doors of the Ho-o-do, depicting the Descent of the Amida Buddha, are an early example of Yamato-e, Japanese-style painting, and contain representations of the scenery around Kyoto.
E-maki: In the last century of the Heian period, the horizontal, illustrated narrative handscroll, the e-maki, came to the fore. Dating from about 1130, the illustrated 'Tale of Genji' represents one of the high points of Japanese painting. Written about the year 1000 by Murasaki Shikibu, a lady-in-waiting to the Empress Akiko, the novel deals with the life and loves of Prince Genji and the world of the Heian court after his death. The 12th-century artists of the e-maki version devised a system of pictorial conventions that convey visually the emotional content of each scene. In the second half of the century, a different, livelier style of continuous narrative illustration became popular. The Ban Dainagon Ekotoba (late 12th century), a scroll that deals with an intrigue at court, emphasizes figures in active motion depicted in rapidly executed brush strokes and thin but vibrant colors.
E-maki also serve as some of the earliest and greatest examples of the otoko-e (Men's pictures) and onna-e (Women's pictures) styles of painting. There are many fine differences in the two styles, appealing to the aesthetic preferences of the genders. But perhaps most easily noticeable are the differences in subject matter. Onna-e, epitomized by the Tale of Genji handscroll, typically deals with court life, particularly the court ladies, and with romantic themes. Otoko-e, on the other hand, often recorded historical events, particularly battles. The Siege of the Sanjō Palace (1160), depicted in the painting "Night Attack on the Sanjō Palace" is a famous example of this style.
Kamakura art
In 1180 a war broke out between the two most powerful warrior clans, the Taira and the Minamoto; five years later the Minamoto emerged victorious and established a de facto seat of government at the seaside village of Kamakura, where it remained until 1333. With the shift of power from the nobility to the warrior class, the arts had to satisfy a new audience: men devoted to the skills of warfare, priests committed to making Buddhism available to illiterate commoners, and conservatives, the nobility and some members of the priesthood who regretted the declining power of the court. Thus, realism, a popularizing trend, and a classical revival characterize the art of the Kamakura period.
Sculpture: The Kei school of sculptors, particularly Unkei, created a new, more realistic style of sculpture. The two Niō guardian images (1203) in the Great South Gate of the Tōdai-ji in Nara illustrate Unkei's dynamic suprarealistic style. The images, about 8 m (about 26 ft) tall, were carved of multiple blocks in a period of about three months, a feat indicative of a developed studio system of artisans working under the direction of a master sculptor. Unkei's polychromed wood sculptures (1208, Kōfuku-ji, Nara) of two Indian sages, Muchaku and Seshin, the legendary founders of the Hosso sect, are among the most accomplished realistic works of the period; as rendered by Unkei, they are remarkably individualized and believable images.
Calligraphy and painting: The Kegon Engi Emaki, the illustrated history of the founding of the Kegon sect, is an excellent example of the popularizing trend in Kamakura painting. The Kegon sect, one of the most important in the Nara period, fell on hard times during the ascendancy of the Pure Land sects. After the Genpei War (1180-1185), Priest Myōe of Kōzan-ji temple sought to revive the sect and also to provide a refuge for women widowed by the war. The wives of samurai had been discouraged from learning more than a syllabary system for transcribing sounds and ideas (see kana), and most were incapable of reading texts that employed Chinese ideographs (kanji). Thus, the Kegon Engi Emaki combines passages of text, written with a maximum of easily readable syllables, and illustrations that have the dialogue between characters written next to the speakers, a technique comparable to contemporary comic strips. The plot of the e-maki, the lives of the two Korean priests who founded the Kegon sect, is swiftly paced and filled with fantastic feats such as a journey to the palace of the Ocean King, and a poignant love story.
A work in a more conservative vein is the illustrated version of Murasaki Shikibu's diary. E-maki versions of her novel continued to be produced, but the nobility, attuned to the new interest in realism yet nostalgic for past days of wealth and power, revived and illustrated the diary in order to recapture the splendor of the author's times. One of the most beautiful passages illustrates the episode in which Murasaki Shikibu is playfully held prisoner in her room by two young courtiers, while, just outside, moonlight gleams on the mossy banks of a rivulet in the imperial garden.
Muromachi art
During the Muromachi period (1338-1573), also called the Ashikaga period, a profound change took place in Japanese culture. The Ashikaga clan took control of the shogunate and moved its headquarters back to Kyoto, to the Muromachi district of the city. With the return of government to the capital, the popularizing trends of the Kamakura period came to an end, and cultural expression took on a more aristocratic, elitist character. Zen Buddhism, the Ch'an sect traditionally thought to have been founded in China in the 6th century CE, was introduced for a second time into Japan and took root.
Painting: Because of secular ventures and trading missions to China organized by Zen temples, many Chinese paintings and objects of art were imported into Japan and profoundly influenced Japanese artists working for Zen temples and the shogunate. Not only did these imports change the subject matter of painting, but they also modified the use of color; the bright colors of Yamato-e yielded to the monochromes of painting in the Chinese manner, where paintings generally only have black and white or different tones of a single color.
Typical of early Muromachi painting is the depiction by the priest-painter Kao (active early 15th century) of the legendary monk Kensu (Hsien-tzu in Chinese) at the moment he achieved enlightenment. This type of painting was executed with quick brush strokes and a minimum of detail. 'Catching a Catfish with a Gourd' (early 15th century, Taizo-in, Myoshin-ji, Kyoto), by the priest-painter Josetsu (active c. 1400), marks a turning point in Muromachi painting. Executed originally for a low-standing screen, it has been remounted as a hanging scroll with inscriptions by contemporary figures above, one of which refers to the painting as being in the "new style." In the foreground a man is depicted on the bank of a stream holding a small gourd and looking at a large slithery catfish. Mist fills the middle ground, and the background mountains appear to be far in the distance. It is generally assumed that the "new style" of the painting, executed about 1413, refers to a more Chinese sense of deep space within the picture plane.
The foremost artists of the Muromachi period are the priest-painters Shubun and Sesshu. Shubun, a monk at the Kyoto temple of Shokoku-ji, created in the painting 'Reading in a Bamboo Grove' (1446) a realistic landscape with deep recession into space. Sesshu, unlike most artists of the period, was able to journey to China and study Chinese painting at its source. 'The Long Handscroll' is one of Sesshu's most accomplished works, depicting a continuing landscape through the four seasons.: Because of secular ventures and trading missions to China organized by Zen temples, many Chinese paintings and objects of art were imported into Japan and profoundly influenced Japanese artists working for Zen temples and the shogunate. Not only did these imports change the subject matter of painting, but they also modified the use of color; the bright colors of Yamato-e yielded to the monochromes of painting in the Chinese manner, where paintings generally only have black and white or different tones of a single color.
Typical of early Muromachi painting is the depiction by the priest-painter Kao (active early 15th century) of the legendary monk Kensu (Hsien-tzu in Chinese) at the moment he achieved enlightenment. This type of painting was executed with quick brush strokes and a minimum of detail. 'Catching a Catfish with a Gourd' (early 15th century, Taizo-in, Myoshin-ji, Kyoto), by the priest-painter Josetsu (active c. 1400), marks a turning point in Muromachi painting. Executed originally for a low-standing screen, it has been remounted as a hanging scroll with inscriptions by contemporary figures above, one of which refers to the painting as being in the "new style." In the foreground a man is depicted on the bank of a stream holding a small gourd and looking at a large slithery catfish. Mist fills the middle ground, and the background mountains appear to be far in the distance. It is generally assumed that the "new style" of the painting, executed about 1413, refers to a more Chinese sense of deep space within the picture plane.
The foremost artists of the Muromachi period are the priest-painters Shubun and Sesshu. Shubun, a monk at the Kyoto temple of Shokoku-ji, created in the painting 'Reading in a Bamboo Grove' (1446) a realistic landscape with deep recession into space. Sesshu, unlike most artists of the period, was able to journey to China and study Chinese painting at its source. 'The Long Handscroll' is one of Sesshu's most accomplished works, depicting a continuing landscape through the four seasons.
The first settlers of Japan, the Jōmon people (c 11000?–c 300 BC), named for the cord markings that decorated the surfaces of their clay vessels, were nomadic hunter-gatherers who later practiced organized farming and built cities with population of hundreds if not thousands. They built simple houses of wood and thatch set into shallow earthen pits to provide warmth from the soil. They crafted lavishly decorated pottery storage vessels, clay figurines called dogu, and crystal jewels.
Yayoi art
The next wave of immigrants was the Yayoi people, named for the district in Tokyo where remnants of their settlements first were found. These people, arriving in Japan about 350 BC, brought their knowledge of wetland rice cultivation, the manufacture of copper weapons and bronze bells (dōtaku), and wheel-thrown, kiln-fired ceramics.
Kofun art
The third stage in Japanese prehistory, the Kofun, or Tumulus, period (c AD 250–552), represents a modification of Yayoi culture, attributable either to internal development or external force. In this period, diverse groups of people formed political alliances and coalesced into a nation. Typical artifacts are bronze mirrors, symbols of political alliances, and clay sculptures called haniwa which were erected outside tombs.
Asuka and Nara art
During the Asuka and Nara periods, so named because the seat of Japanese government was located in the Asuka Valley from 552 to 710 and in the city of Nara until 784, the first significant invasion by Asian continental culture took place in Japan.
The transmission of Buddhism provided the initial impetus for contacts between China, Korea and Japan. The Japanese recognized the facets of Chinese culture that could profitably be incorporated into their own: a system for converting ideas and sounds into writing; historiography; complex theories of government, such as an effective bureaucracy; and, most important for the arts, new technologies, new building techniques, more advanced methods of casting in bronze, and new techniques and media for painting.
Throughout the 7th and 8th centuries, however, the major focus in contacts between Japan and the Asian continent was the development of Buddhism. Not all scholars agree on the significant dates and the appropriate names to apply to various time periods between 552, the official date of the introduction of Buddhism into Japan, and 784, when the Japanese capital was transferred from Nara. The most common designations are the Suiko period, 552–645; the Hakuho period, 645–710, and the Tenpyō period, 710–784.
The earliest Japanese sculptures of the Buddha are dated to the 6th and 7th century. They ultimately derive from the 1st-3rd century CE Greco-Buddhist art of Gandhara, characterized by flowing dress patterns and realistic rendering, on which Chinese and Korean artistic traits were superimposed.[1] They illustrate the terminal point of the Silk Road transmission of Art during the first few centuries of our era. Other examples can be found in the development of the iconography of the Japanese Fujin Wind God,[2] the Nio guardians,[3] and the near-Classical floral patterns in temple decorations.[4]
The earliest Buddhist structures still extant in Japan, and the oldest wooden buildings in the Far East are found at the Hōryū-ji to the southwest of Nara. First built in the early 7th century as the private temple of Crown Prince Shotoku, it consists of 41 independent buildings. The most important ones, the main worship hall, or Kondo (Golden Hall), and Goju-no-to (Five-story Pagoda), stand in the center of an open area surrounded by a roofed cloister. The Kondo, in the style of Chinese worship halls, is a two-story structure of post-and-beam construction, capped by an irimoya, or hipped-gabled roof of ceramic tiles.
Inside the Kondo, on a large rectangular platform, are some of the most important sculptures of the period. The central image is a Shaka Trinity (623), the historical Buddha flanked by two bodhisattvas, sculpture cast in bronze by the sculptor Tori Busshi (flourished early 7th century) in homage to the recently deceased Prince Shotoku. At the four corners of the platform are the Guardian Kings of the Four Directions, carved in wood around 650. Also housed at Hōryū-ji is the Tamamushi Shrine, a wooden replica of a Kondo, which is set on a high wooden base that is decorated with figural paintings executed in a medium of mineral pigments mixed with lacquer.
Temple building in the 8th century was focused around the Tōdai-ji in Nara. Constructed as the headquarters for a network of temples in each of the provinces, the Tōdaiji is the most ambitious religious complex erected in the early centuries of Buddhist worship in Japan. Appropriately, the 16.2-m (53-ft) Buddha (completed 752) enshrined in the main Buddha hall, or Daibutsuden, is a Rushana Buddha, the figure that represents the essence of Buddhahood, just as the Tōdaiji represented the center for Imperially sponsored Buddhism and its dissemination throughout Japan. Only a few fragments of the original statue survive, and the present hall and central Buddha are reconstructions from the Edo period.
Clustered around the Daibutsuden on a gently sloping hillside are a number of secondary halls: the Hokkedo (Lotus Sutra Hall), with its principal image, the Fukukenjaku Kannon (the most popular bodhisattva), crafted of dry lacquer (cloth dipped in lacquer and shaped over a wooden armature); the Kaidanin (Ordination Hall) with its magnificent clay statues of the Four Guardian Kings; and the storehouse, called the Shosoin. This last structure is of great importance as an art-historical cache, because in it are stored the utensils that were used in the temple's dedication ceremony in 752, the eye-opening ritual for the Rushana image, as well as government documents and many secular objects owned by the Imperial family.
Heian art
In 794 the capital of Japan was officially transferred to Heian-kyo (present-day Kyoto), where it remained until 1868. The term Heian period refers to the years between 794 and 1185, when the Kamakura shogunate was established at the end of the Genpei War. The period is further divided into the early Heian and the late Heian, or Fujiwara era, the pivotal date being 894, the year imperial embassies to China were officially discontinued.
Early Heian art: In reaction to the growing wealth and power of organized Buddhism in Nara, the priest Kūkai (best known by his posthumous title Kōbō Daishi, 774-835) journeyed to China to study Shingon, a form of Vajrayana Buddhism, which he introduced into Japan in 806. At the core of Shingon worship are mandalas, diagrams of the spiritual universe, which then began to influence temple design. Japanese Buddhist architecture also adopted the stupa, originally an Indian architectural form, in its Chinese-style pagoda.
The temples erected for this new sect were built in the mountains, far away from the Court and the laity in the capital. The irregular topography of these sites forced Japanese architects to rethink the problems of temple construction, and in so doing to choose more indigenous elements of design. Cypress-bark roofs replaced those of ceramic tile, wood planks were used instead of earthen floors, and a separate worship area for the laity was added in front of the main sanctuary.
The temple that best reflects the spirit of early Heian Shingon temples is the Muro-ji (early 9th century), set deep in a stand of cypress trees on a mountain southeast of Nara. The wooden image (also early 9th c.) of Shakyamuni, the "historic" Buddha, enshrined in a secondary building at the Muro-ji, is typical of the early Heian sculpture, with its ponderous body, covered by thick drapery folds carved in the hompa-shiki (rolling-wave) style, and its austere, withdrawn facial expression.
Fujiwara art: In the Fujiwara period, Pure Land Buddhism, which offered easy salvation through belief in Amida (the Buddha of the Western Paradise), became popular. This period is named after the Fujiwara family, then the most powerful in the country, who ruled as regents for the Emperor, becoming, in effect, civil dictators. Concurrently, the Kyoto nobility developed a society devoted to elegant aesthetic pursuits. So secure and beautiful was their world that they could not conceive of Paradise as being much different. They created a new form of Buddha hall, the Amida hall, which blends the secular with the religious, and houses one or more Buddha images within a structure resembling the mansions of the nobility.
The Ho-o-do (Phoenix Hall, completed 1053) of the Byodoin, a temple in Uji to the southeast of Kyoto, is the exemplar of Fujiwara Amida halls. It consists of a main rectangular structure flanked by two L-shaped wing corridors and a tail corridor, set at the edge of a large artificial pond. Inside, a single golden image of Amida (c. 1053) is installed on a high platform. The Amida sculpture was executed by Jocho, who used a new canon of proportions and a new technique (yosegi), in which multiple pieces of wood are carved out like shells and joined from the inside. Applied to the walls of the hall are small relief carvings of celestials, the host believed to have accompanied Amida when he descended from the Western Paradise to gather the souls of believers at the moment of death and transport them in lotus blossoms to Paradise. Raigo paintings on the wooden doors of the Ho-o-do, depicting the Descent of the Amida Buddha, are an early example of Yamato-e, Japanese-style painting, and contain representations of the scenery around Kyoto.
E-maki: In the last century of the Heian period, the horizontal, illustrated narrative handscroll, the e-maki, came to the fore. Dating from about 1130, the illustrated 'Tale of Genji' represents one of the high points of Japanese painting. Written about the year 1000 by Murasaki Shikibu, a lady-in-waiting to the Empress Akiko, the novel deals with the life and loves of Prince Genji and the world of the Heian court after his death. The 12th-century artists of the e-maki version devised a system of pictorial conventions that convey visually the emotional content of each scene. In the second half of the century, a different, livelier style of continuous narrative illustration became popular. The Ban Dainagon Ekotoba (late 12th century), a scroll that deals with an intrigue at court, emphasizes figures in active motion depicted in rapidly executed brush strokes and thin but vibrant colors.
E-maki also serve as some of the earliest and greatest examples of the otoko-e (Men's pictures) and onna-e (Women's pictures) styles of painting. There are many fine differences in the two styles, appealing to the aesthetic preferences of the genders. But perhaps most easily noticeable are the differences in subject matter. Onna-e, epitomized by the Tale of Genji handscroll, typically deals with court life, particularly the court ladies, and with romantic themes. Otoko-e, on the other hand, often recorded historical events, particularly battles. The Siege of the Sanjō Palace (1160), depicted in the painting "Night Attack on the Sanjō Palace" is a famous example of this style.
Kamakura art
In 1180 a war broke out between the two most powerful warrior clans, the Taira and the Minamoto; five years later the Minamoto emerged victorious and established a de facto seat of government at the seaside village of Kamakura, where it remained until 1333. With the shift of power from the nobility to the warrior class, the arts had to satisfy a new audience: men devoted to the skills of warfare, priests committed to making Buddhism available to illiterate commoners, and conservatives, the nobility and some members of the priesthood who regretted the declining power of the court. Thus, realism, a popularizing trend, and a classical revival characterize the art of the Kamakura period.
Sculpture: The Kei school of sculptors, particularly Unkei, created a new, more realistic style of sculpture. The two Niō guardian images (1203) in the Great South Gate of the Tōdai-ji in Nara illustrate Unkei's dynamic suprarealistic style. The images, about 8 m (about 26 ft) tall, were carved of multiple blocks in a period of about three months, a feat indicative of a developed studio system of artisans working under the direction of a master sculptor. Unkei's polychromed wood sculptures (1208, Kōfuku-ji, Nara) of two Indian sages, Muchaku and Seshin, the legendary founders of the Hosso sect, are among the most accomplished realistic works of the period; as rendered by Unkei, they are remarkably individualized and believable images.
Calligraphy and painting: The Kegon Engi Emaki, the illustrated history of the founding of the Kegon sect, is an excellent example of the popularizing trend in Kamakura painting. The Kegon sect, one of the most important in the Nara period, fell on hard times during the ascendancy of the Pure Land sects. After the Genpei War (1180-1185), Priest Myōe of Kōzan-ji temple sought to revive the sect and also to provide a refuge for women widowed by the war. The wives of samurai had been discouraged from learning more than a syllabary system for transcribing sounds and ideas (see kana), and most were incapable of reading texts that employed Chinese ideographs (kanji). Thus, the Kegon Engi Emaki combines passages of text, written with a maximum of easily readable syllables, and illustrations that have the dialogue between characters written next to the speakers, a technique comparable to contemporary comic strips. The plot of the e-maki, the lives of the two Korean priests who founded the Kegon sect, is swiftly paced and filled with fantastic feats such as a journey to the palace of the Ocean King, and a poignant love story.
A work in a more conservative vein is the illustrated version of Murasaki Shikibu's diary. E-maki versions of her novel continued to be produced, but the nobility, attuned to the new interest in realism yet nostalgic for past days of wealth and power, revived and illustrated the diary in order to recapture the splendor of the author's times. One of the most beautiful passages illustrates the episode in which Murasaki Shikibu is playfully held prisoner in her room by two young courtiers, while, just outside, moonlight gleams on the mossy banks of a rivulet in the imperial garden.
Muromachi art
During the Muromachi period (1338-1573), also called the Ashikaga period, a profound change took place in Japanese culture. The Ashikaga clan took control of the shogunate and moved its headquarters back to Kyoto, to the Muromachi district of the city. With the return of government to the capital, the popularizing trends of the Kamakura period came to an end, and cultural expression took on a more aristocratic, elitist character. Zen Buddhism, the Ch'an sect traditionally thought to have been founded in China in the 6th century CE, was introduced for a second time into Japan and took root.
Painting: Because of secular ventures and trading missions to China organized by Zen temples, many Chinese paintings and objects of art were imported into Japan and profoundly influenced Japanese artists working for Zen temples and the shogunate. Not only did these imports change the subject matter of painting, but they also modified the use of color; the bright colors of Yamato-e yielded to the monochromes of painting in the Chinese manner, where paintings generally only have black and white or different tones of a single color.
Typical of early Muromachi painting is the depiction by the priest-painter Kao (active early 15th century) of the legendary monk Kensu (Hsien-tzu in Chinese) at the moment he achieved enlightenment. This type of painting was executed with quick brush strokes and a minimum of detail. 'Catching a Catfish with a Gourd' (early 15th century, Taizo-in, Myoshin-ji, Kyoto), by the priest-painter Josetsu (active c. 1400), marks a turning point in Muromachi painting. Executed originally for a low-standing screen, it has been remounted as a hanging scroll with inscriptions by contemporary figures above, one of which refers to the painting as being in the "new style." In the foreground a man is depicted on the bank of a stream holding a small gourd and looking at a large slithery catfish. Mist fills the middle ground, and the background mountains appear to be far in the distance. It is generally assumed that the "new style" of the painting, executed about 1413, refers to a more Chinese sense of deep space within the picture plane.
The foremost artists of the Muromachi period are the priest-painters Shubun and Sesshu. Shubun, a monk at the Kyoto temple of Shokoku-ji, created in the painting 'Reading in a Bamboo Grove' (1446) a realistic landscape with deep recession into space. Sesshu, unlike most artists of the period, was able to journey to China and study Chinese painting at its source. 'The Long Handscroll' is one of Sesshu's most accomplished works, depicting a continuing landscape through the four seasons.: Because of secular ventures and trading missions to China organized by Zen temples, many Chinese paintings and objects of art were imported into Japan and profoundly influenced Japanese artists working for Zen temples and the shogunate. Not only did these imports change the subject matter of painting, but they also modified the use of color; the bright colors of Yamato-e yielded to the monochromes of painting in the Chinese manner, where paintings generally only have black and white or different tones of a single color.
Typical of early Muromachi painting is the depiction by the priest-painter Kao (active early 15th century) of the legendary monk Kensu (Hsien-tzu in Chinese) at the moment he achieved enlightenment. This type of painting was executed with quick brush strokes and a minimum of detail. 'Catching a Catfish with a Gourd' (early 15th century, Taizo-in, Myoshin-ji, Kyoto), by the priest-painter Josetsu (active c. 1400), marks a turning point in Muromachi painting. Executed originally for a low-standing screen, it has been remounted as a hanging scroll with inscriptions by contemporary figures above, one of which refers to the painting as being in the "new style." In the foreground a man is depicted on the bank of a stream holding a small gourd and looking at a large slithery catfish. Mist fills the middle ground, and the background mountains appear to be far in the distance. It is generally assumed that the "new style" of the painting, executed about 1413, refers to a more Chinese sense of deep space within the picture plane.
The foremost artists of the Muromachi period are the priest-painters Shubun and Sesshu. Shubun, a monk at the Kyoto temple of Shokoku-ji, created in the painting 'Reading in a Bamboo Grove' (1446) a realistic landscape with deep recession into space. Sesshu, unlike most artists of the period, was able to journey to China and study Chinese painting at its source. 'The Long Handscroll' is one of Sesshu's most accomplished works, depicting a continuing landscape through the four seasons.
Japanese art
Japanese art covers a wide range of art styles and media, including ancient pottery, sculpture in wood and bronze, ink painting on silk and paper, and a myriad of other types of works of art. It also has a long history, ranging from the beginnings of human habitation in Japan, sometime in the 10th millennium BC, to the present.
Historically, Japan has been subject to sudden invasions of new and alien ideas followed by long periods of minimal contact with the outside world. Over time the Japanese developed the ability to absorb, imitate, and finally assimilate those elements of foreign culture that complemented their aesthetic preferences. The earliest complex art in Japan was produced in the 7th and 8th centuries A.D. in connection with Buddhism. In the 9th century, as the Japanese began to turn away from China and develop indigenous forms of expression, the secular arts became increasingly important; until the late 15th century, both religious and secular arts flourished. After the Ōnin War (1467-1477), Japan entered a period of political, social, and economic disruption that lasted for over a century. In the state that emerged under the leadership of the Tokugawa shogunate,organized religion played a much less important role in people's lives, and the arts that survived were primarily secular.
Painting is the preferred artistic expression in Japan, practiced by amateur and professional alike. Until modern times, the Japanese wrote with a brush rather than a pen, and their familiarity with brush techniques has made them particularly sensitive to the values and aesthetics of painting. With the rise of popular culture in the Edo period, a style of woodblock prints called ukiyo-e became a major artform and its techniques were fine tuned to produce colorful prints of everything from daily news to schoolbooks. The Japanese, in this period, found sculpture a much less sympathetic medium for artistic expression; most Japanese sculpture is associated with religion, and the medium's use declined with the lessening importance of traditional Buddhism.
Japanese ceramics are among the finest in the world and include the earliest known artifacts of their culture. In architecture, Japanese preferences for natural materials and an interaction of interior and exterior space are clearly expressed.
Today, Japan rivals most other modern nations in its contributions to modern art, fashion and architecture, with creations of a truly modern, global, and multi-cultural (or acultural) bent.
Historically, Japan has been subject to sudden invasions of new and alien ideas followed by long periods of minimal contact with the outside world. Over time the Japanese developed the ability to absorb, imitate, and finally assimilate those elements of foreign culture that complemented their aesthetic preferences. The earliest complex art in Japan was produced in the 7th and 8th centuries A.D. in connection with Buddhism. In the 9th century, as the Japanese began to turn away from China and develop indigenous forms of expression, the secular arts became increasingly important; until the late 15th century, both religious and secular arts flourished. After the Ōnin War (1467-1477), Japan entered a period of political, social, and economic disruption that lasted for over a century. In the state that emerged under the leadership of the Tokugawa shogunate,organized religion played a much less important role in people's lives, and the arts that survived were primarily secular.
Painting is the preferred artistic expression in Japan, practiced by amateur and professional alike. Until modern times, the Japanese wrote with a brush rather than a pen, and their familiarity with brush techniques has made them particularly sensitive to the values and aesthetics of painting. With the rise of popular culture in the Edo period, a style of woodblock prints called ukiyo-e became a major artform and its techniques were fine tuned to produce colorful prints of everything from daily news to schoolbooks. The Japanese, in this period, found sculpture a much less sympathetic medium for artistic expression; most Japanese sculpture is associated with religion, and the medium's use declined with the lessening importance of traditional Buddhism.
Japanese ceramics are among the finest in the world and include the earliest known artifacts of their culture. In architecture, Japanese preferences for natural materials and an interaction of interior and exterior space are clearly expressed.
Today, Japan rivals most other modern nations in its contributions to modern art, fashion and architecture, with creations of a truly modern, global, and multi-cultural (or acultural) bent.
Sunday, January 13, 2008
The underlying structure, drawings, and special effects
As with any large scale creation involving multiple workers, a diagram of the final structure can be a handy tool. Sadly, one of my greatest weaknesses is the lack of any real drawing skill. My art is balloons. In fact, I think of a balloon as a paintbrush. I find it much easier to create with balloons than a pencil. When I do drawings of my smaller sculptures as teaching tools for others, it's only after I've already twisted the figure. I then work with a figure in front of me as I put it into two dimensional form.
I've never before worked with someone else in creating a huge balloon sculpture. I've always done it myself. I often work with constraints in mind, and as I sculpt, I shape things and modify my plan in order to make it work and make it look as good as possible. However, I had up to two dozen people working at once on this project. There was no way for me to do it myself, even if that's what I had been hired to do. What's more, I couldn't coach each person individually through the whole thing. Had I found a way to be in more than one place at time, there still would have been the language barrier. Clearly drawings were essential.
To top it all off, I was asked to send drawings a couple weeks ahead of time to make sure that my vision was the same as that of the television people. With some drawings of traditional nebuta sculptures to work from, I set out to draw my own. It was good that they asked since my understanding of what they wanted wasn't quite right. The hard part was in showign them what I wanted to do. I would have greatly preferred someone else giving me a drawing and telling me which things were important and which things allowed for my creativity. Regardless, I got through it.
Typically, I don't work with framing materials, but there were several reasons for using a framework of some sort here. The frame wasn't actually necessary in the end, which was my preference, but the insurance it provided was well worth having.
I've never before worked with someone else in creating a huge balloon sculpture. I've always done it myself. I often work with constraints in mind, and as I sculpt, I shape things and modify my plan in order to make it work and make it look as good as possible. However, I had up to two dozen people working at once on this project. There was no way for me to do it myself, even if that's what I had been hired to do. What's more, I couldn't coach each person individually through the whole thing. Had I found a way to be in more than one place at time, there still would have been the language barrier. Clearly drawings were essential.
To top it all off, I was asked to send drawings a couple weeks ahead of time to make sure that my vision was the same as that of the television people. With some drawings of traditional nebuta sculptures to work from, I set out to draw my own. It was good that they asked since my understanding of what they wanted wasn't quite right. The hard part was in showign them what I wanted to do. I would have greatly preferred someone else giving me a drawing and telling me which things were important and which things allowed for my creativity. Regardless, I got through it.
Typically, I don't work with framing materials, but there were several reasons for using a framework of some sort here. The frame wasn't actually necessary in the end, which was my preference, but the insurance it provided was well worth having.
Demon
The demon had to sharply contrast the samurai. We decided to make the face of the demon completely inhuman in size. Since we were very careful about the samurai's proportions, we knew that an oversized demon face would stand out against it. Anyone perusing the original sketches can see that this was not part of the original plan, but with several stumbling blocks overcome, we were able to make a single piece that stood 12 feet tall on it's own.
It doesn't take a lot of close examination to see that we built the demon head using a similar method to the samurai kimono. This allowed us to make something very large and with a very nice texture without the time necessary to make a lot of small bubbles. We also broke down the head into three distinct sections that were then attached to each other.
The mid section of the head was simply a very wide cylinder. The top portion was essentially a dish that got placed on top. Unfortunately, I took a two hour rest during which the staff decided to help me and atach that top portion. I wasn't quite ready for that and it took some interesting maneuvering to finish it all off once it was mounted on the frame.
The hardest part of the head was assembling the lower portion. Since the mid section and top were placed on the frame before the botom was completed, the head was suspended in the air with a three foot gap underneath it. We found the quickest and easiest approach to completing the bottom portion was to work downward from the lowest portion of the head until we hit the platform.
My original plans called for hair that was as full and rigid as the samurai's hair. Unfortunately, that wasn't possible due to time constraints. The simpler, faster, and still interesting look that we went with was accomplished simply by shoving fully inflated balloons into the spaces all over the top and back of the head.
The facial features were all made on the side while the head was being constructed. Finishing off the demon required some rather tall ladders and a number of hands.
It doesn't take a lot of close examination to see that we built the demon head using a similar method to the samurai kimono. This allowed us to make something very large and with a very nice texture without the time necessary to make a lot of small bubbles. We also broke down the head into three distinct sections that were then attached to each other.
The mid section of the head was simply a very wide cylinder. The top portion was essentially a dish that got placed on top. Unfortunately, I took a two hour rest during which the staff decided to help me and atach that top portion. I wasn't quite ready for that and it took some interesting maneuvering to finish it all off once it was mounted on the frame.
The hardest part of the head was assembling the lower portion. Since the mid section and top were placed on the frame before the botom was completed, the head was suspended in the air with a three foot gap underneath it. We found the quickest and easiest approach to completing the bottom portion was to work downward from the lowest portion of the head until we hit the platform.
My original plans called for hair that was as full and rigid as the samurai's hair. Unfortunately, that wasn't possible due to time constraints. The simpler, faster, and still interesting look that we went with was accomplished simply by shoving fully inflated balloons into the spaces all over the top and back of the head.
The facial features were all made on the side while the head was being constructed. Finishing off the demon required some rather tall ladders and a number of hands.
Samurai
The face of the samurai posed a serious challenge for a number of reasons. Not the least of which were creative differences between myself and the director of the show. That, followed with the fact that an American like myself, obviously didn't quite understand some of the things that were important on a sculpture of this sort to the Japanese folks I was working with.
What we were faced with was me trying to design something I didn't understand, and a bunch of informed Japanese trying to change the design in ways that weren't possible. We eventually managed to reach a compromise and it all came together quite satisfactorily.
As you can see from the image, a serious effort was made to capture the fierceness of a samurai warrior. We spent quite a lot of time experimenting with facial expressions. Several attempts at facial features were tossed aside until we found something everyone was happy with.
The director was being quite picky about the face, so making plans for that, he asked that the crew work on the face during the training and practice sessions in order to get a preview that he could think about for a while. It ended up being changed far more than expected before it was over. In fact, the original face was even a different color. When we started out we were very concerned about the color matching a skin tone as closely as possible. Later, it was decided to switch to the kabuki look (white face) seen on this page.
While the dimensions of the sculpture were mentioned above, the numbers seem to have very little impact on most people. In fact, to be honest, even as the designer of the figures, despite the fact that I was the one that did all of the calculations for balloon usage, the shear size of it was still rather overwhelming. As it started to take shape, I looked for ways to demonstrate it's hugeness. I think this picture of the samurai's hand does a good job.
I mentioned above the difficulty I had in understanding Japanese art. I reviewed books and web sites with images of samurais as well as other scenes to get a taste of what the staff would be looking for. The production company also provided me with a number of drawings and photos of what they wanted to see in this sculpture. After all of that, I envisioned a samurai in armor to match the fierce facial expressions they had asked for. Instead, what they wanted was a more gentle look in clothing; a nicely patterned kimono.
Kimono aside, this was a warrior, and he needed the ability to fight his mortal enemy. Therefore, a weapon was needed. All of the photos and drawings I had seen pictured a Samurai holding a spear or a sword. I chose a sword since the original plan was to show motion in the final sculpture. By using a sword, the samurai could actually slice the head off the demon. That final special effect ended up not happening, but we stuck with the sword anyway.
Assembling the pieces of the sculpture was quite a chore. The head, which was the first piece made in the practice sessions, was the very last thing to be placed in the entire construction. Positioning was therefore a challenge. I wanted nothing more than to see it in place as soon as possible. The director wanted to create a sense of accomplishment by ending with the single most important piece of the structure with all of the TV cameras rolling. That only made the task harder, and admittedly, more dramatic as the crews and other TV people started to show up and watch. Of course, that kept me in a panic with my watch in my hand the whole time. At least, upon completion, it had the look that everyone had hoped for after days of discussions and arguments.
What we were faced with was me trying to design something I didn't understand, and a bunch of informed Japanese trying to change the design in ways that weren't possible. We eventually managed to reach a compromise and it all came together quite satisfactorily.
As you can see from the image, a serious effort was made to capture the fierceness of a samurai warrior. We spent quite a lot of time experimenting with facial expressions. Several attempts at facial features were tossed aside until we found something everyone was happy with.
The director was being quite picky about the face, so making plans for that, he asked that the crew work on the face during the training and practice sessions in order to get a preview that he could think about for a while. It ended up being changed far more than expected before it was over. In fact, the original face was even a different color. When we started out we were very concerned about the color matching a skin tone as closely as possible. Later, it was decided to switch to the kabuki look (white face) seen on this page.
While the dimensions of the sculpture were mentioned above, the numbers seem to have very little impact on most people. In fact, to be honest, even as the designer of the figures, despite the fact that I was the one that did all of the calculations for balloon usage, the shear size of it was still rather overwhelming. As it started to take shape, I looked for ways to demonstrate it's hugeness. I think this picture of the samurai's hand does a good job.
I mentioned above the difficulty I had in understanding Japanese art. I reviewed books and web sites with images of samurais as well as other scenes to get a taste of what the staff would be looking for. The production company also provided me with a number of drawings and photos of what they wanted to see in this sculpture. After all of that, I envisioned a samurai in armor to match the fierce facial expressions they had asked for. Instead, what they wanted was a more gentle look in clothing; a nicely patterned kimono.
Kimono aside, this was a warrior, and he needed the ability to fight his mortal enemy. Therefore, a weapon was needed. All of the photos and drawings I had seen pictured a Samurai holding a spear or a sword. I chose a sword since the original plan was to show motion in the final sculpture. By using a sword, the samurai could actually slice the head off the demon. That final special effect ended up not happening, but we stuck with the sword anyway.
Assembling the pieces of the sculpture was quite a chore. The head, which was the first piece made in the practice sessions, was the very last thing to be placed in the entire construction. Positioning was therefore a challenge. I wanted nothing more than to see it in place as soon as possible. The director wanted to create a sense of accomplishment by ending with the single most important piece of the structure with all of the TV cameras rolling. That only made the task harder, and admittedly, more dramatic as the crews and other TV people started to show up and watch. Of course, that kept me in a panic with my watch in my hand the whole time. At least, upon completion, it had the look that everyone had hoped for after days of discussions and arguments.
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