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ロサンゼルスの日々再び+水墨画ねずみ集

I will be Los Angels till 5th of December from tomorrow. Hyatt Regency near Hollywood will be my stay. Those loves sumi-e, please let me know. would be nice to get together.

Click left three mouse for more sumi-e images

左図をクリックすると水墨画ねずみ年賀状の素材になります。

年賀状素材販売してます。額縁の絵をクリックを

Sumi-e Drawing Cosmos

How to draw cosmos with sumi ink. (click image left to see more sumi-e image)

Is there cosmos flower around you all?? It is cosmos and red maple leaves that reminds me of the autumn arrival. We have hit tune named "cosmos" in ’70s. The Chinese charactor for cosmos is "cherry blossom of autumn". Cosmos is kind of flower we are familiar with. Few chances to see the real cosmos blooming in Tokyo life though…

Cosmos has bright colour flower with skinny line brunch. That gives us the impression of fleeting in the wind, a littel girl lingered in the field. It might be the reason of this flower popularity.

However, the flower is thick and the edge of flower split in two.

You might split the brush top or draw twice to depict this thick flower. The pistil is large and round shape in the center.

The diversity of the angle of flower face will tell us the wind blowing and the skinny flower are flickering. The angle of face is expressed by the length of each flower.

For face up : short down, long up,  Face right :  left long, right short, Face down : short up long down.

One flower must finish to draw with one ink dip so that you can obtain the gradation. On one paper, you should put thick black flower and white flower as well.

You should express what you want to tell, with changing the angle and the density of each flower.

Los Angels Sumi-e Hybiscas

In the beginning of the summer season, just afeter the blue hydransia had finished its blooming, I found huge white flower on the street down the corner of my house. The rainy season smell was still floating in the air. This is like jellyfish swirling over there. Back in home and chcking the web site, the white large is a "cotton rose ", "confederate rose" or fuyou in Japanese.

The summer’s gone. I saw a white flower on the top of a streching stalk beside a pavement near the office. This is called mallow, or aoi (ah-oh-ee).

Mallow is smaller than cotton rose and looking for the sunlight like small kids wants candy streching out on the tiptoe. Cotton rose is floating closed on earth like a pale moon rising.

At the end of October, Los Angels has lots of red big roses there. It resemble to the cotton flower or hybiscas in Hawaii. 

The cotton rose leaves are spiky on the edge, very large and thick, and deep green. It tells us they comes from the South. The mallow’s leave are small and grow the quater degree in a clockwise.

This image above is named Flower Butterfly, remixing my Tokyo and Los Angels flower expierience of the summer. Pale white flower is wafting down up the sky.

Please take a littel time to look at the drawing process by clicking the below video.This work comes across a scroll and now floating in a room as well.  see this beautiful complete of kakejiku by Ms. Izumi Murakami

Quadrophenia, Sumi-e Four Seasons

Quadrophenia, this is one of the album I like most and movie as well. When I got ordered four pieces of sumi-e each of which on four season’s motif, this great album of "The Who" occured to me.

I saw the movie of "Quadrophenia" back in the high school days. It was very impressive that the rock music can make a noise in the film. The young "Sting" from the Police shows his face as "Ace". I liked skinny mods fashion and Brighton’s soft sun light.

The sun light influenced on the art. It was not until I spent the white night that I understood the Shout, Monk, or the "Persistance de la memoire" of Dali. The silence under the sun was wired because my brain automatically imagines the noize of cars and shouting on the street in the sun. The heavy metal music can’t be understandable until blasting on California highway. The local motion generates the great art.

It influences on words as well. We don’t have a long evening in the summer. I don’t fully understand when to use "Good evening" because the sun sinks vertical angle here, then welcome to the night. We don’t have time to say "good eveing", it is "good night". The way of expression tied closely to everyday life.

The art is born on the frontier. Crossing the border and mix the local flavor. Tradition is the pile of mixturing. The four season style of sumi-e has drawn non Japanese animals like tigers.

It is bored to just stencil the tradional items. That is brain death. To me, four seasons is the quadrophenia, the Who. The personal expierience with the local technique creates new art.

Please take a few moment to look the collaboration with studio Ren, meister Idumi Murakami.   

Flower Dragon sumie Swinging Scrolling

One evening when been in Laos, Luran brapan, 2003, the towering clouds on the Hymayaran mountains happened to me to understand how the ancient people’s thought, fear or respect to the "Nature". This feeling, I guess, is definately what we’ve maintained naturally. Thunder, flood, storm has always been with us no matter how we like or not. They are away beyond..

Now in the business world we think we have to keep working hard. For what? for the shareholders? to achieve the business goal if you are employed. This is the logial world where if you ask, you find the answer for that soon. However, the plan built by the best and the brightest guys would not work sometimes due to the natural disaster like the earthquake or typhoon. No one could plan them. Planning by the brain would surrender.

So, the balance is needed. The logically thinking helps you to have the future dream. The respect for the "Nature" power would ease you, when you fail. The effort at the goal is necessary in this money world. The success never comes itself. What if you fail? That is because of the nature.

Dragon has shaped good from the three thousand years ago. It represent the river or cloud shape. It never the same. Keep changing.

The flower dragon now finds her world of scroll, or Kakejiku, Japanese style of tapestery. Atlier Ren’s meister, Idumi Murakami, makes well her condo. You can see the dragon keep swinging in Murakami’s pret a porter scroll. 

see here -> 掛軸工房”連” 村上いづみ

水墨画 龍の描き方 check out YouTube vid for drawing Dragon head.

I Gilasoli sumi-e 水墨画ひまわり

向日葵, sonneblume, zonnebloem, tournesol

Hi-mawari, sunflower in Japanese, means little interesting, because it indicates a flower that turns around toward the sun’s movement. Sunflower is litterary a flower of the sun, a shape of which reminds of the sun flaire. In English, German, Dutch,,, the attention takes at flower’s shape, however, Asian such as Chinese, Japanese and Latins such as Italian, French, they see the movement of this flower and name after it.

Italin film, "I Gilsoli", shot many beautiful sunflowers veiws. Italian director Vittorio De sica might want to represent the sunflower as people of desperate fate due to a war. He inserted lots of sunflower field cuts. They steals, doesn’t move. If he were northern European, his metapher would have the strong will as the sun-shining-flower. Italian gilasoli is the "moving along the sun". So, I assume that he might represent the sunflower as the fate played by the war, unescapable recruting and another life afterwards like the sunflower turns its face along with the sun’s unchangable moving, the sun is a country as the fate generator, and the sunflower is us.    

Some says in Korea a flattery is called sunflower. It is suprised that sunflower keeps a negative meaning. Only young sunflowers turns their face along with the sun’s move. So Korean means might the unrestness in youth. please let me know, anyone knows this things.   

Give Sumi-e Freedom 水墨画掛軸

Scroll is a lanchbox for the fine art. Rolling it up and just bringing it to anywhere. The scroll drawing originates in 11th – 12th century of the Sohn dynasty. I guess that it was to cater Buddhism icons. After coming to Japan in 11th century, the tea ceremony shifted the scroll up to the art from only the relegious usage. They put the scroll drawing on the wall along with the season change. Various scroll collection is the changable software on the minimal tea ceremony room of minimal. Cherry blossom drawing in the winter makes you feel the spring and warm. Maple leaves lead you to the autumn, forgetting the hot summer, blasting stagnate wind. The scroll art has developped since then. The style optimizes for it to be pretty from the sitting veiw point.

A scroll meister Idumi Murakami of Studio Ren, winds new blow in the tradion. Few places for scroll in the westernized Japanese rooms. She is, residing in Fukushima prefecture the northern Japan, creating the pop scroll. Indigo blue jeans and colorful frame impresses us freshy modern image. Living this colorful world flooding industrial advertising posture, Murakmi’s flavor releaves the high wall of the tradional abstruse style.

With the collaboration of Murakami, sumi-e works breath new air. Please check the above photo for more aesthetic.

掛軸工房"連" 村上いづみ http://blog.livedoor.jp/rennikki/archives/54741484.html

Campsis Grandiflora 水墨画のうぜんかづら

Again, "Trumpet Creeper" is on the dictionary translation and doubt it’s uncommon in English expression, so put a scientific name on it, "Campsis grandiflora". Anyone please lets me know your name of this flower in local.
This orenge flower is now on blooming after hydrangea rainy season here in Japan. We see the pyle of flower on the top of strings hanging from the wall or roof. The shape of flower remainds of the Chinese origine like kanpanera, and it is.
It came here from China in 10th century and had longevity, there is 400 years old of this.

now SEEDS back !!

My organizing this, anyone around Tokyo, getting together for this chance of Japanese art scene.
After the long time break, Japonism art round, SEEDS Tokyo Impact is back at last. August 10th, Friday 21:00 is the time for the mid-summer night slingers to get a reflesh shower with the “Japan Cool” art culture. Coming By.
■SEEDS Tokyo Impact 9th “Sun flower”
[ http://seedstokyoimpact.blogspot.com/ ]
Place: Bullet’s (turn right at the corner of “aLife” @Roppongi) http://bul-lets.com/top.html
Venue: 2000 JPY w/t 1drink
Time: August 10, Friday 21:00 – 4:00
■Live Performance
Ko Ito [Contemporary Dance]
Megumi Hioki [Live Caligraphy]
Norika Kizaki [Japanese Dram]
Refregerator Man [Santd up Comedy]
Kiroku Aoi, Kyo Aoi, Sakura Aoi [Japanese Tradional Dance “Aoi Ryu”]
Hanao [Japanse Blues]
Sandra [Dance]
MOJO Yokoyama [Ethnic Instrument]
■Instaration
Saori Yoshida [Sya-kyo:carigrapy on Buddist book]
Syu Onodera [Ikebana “Sogeturyu”]
MOJOSPRING
Sandrapia []
■DJ
KAZUKI
Mogiwo@STARMAN
■See waht’s happen before :
Vids: http://www.youtube.com/user/seedstokyoimpact
Phots: http://kw.cocolog-nifty.com/photos/seeds_tokyo_impact_tsubak/