Nihonto anime manga game artists, exhibition summer Bizen

[Bugyotsuji]

Poster, front and back.

 

http://www.city.setouchi.lg.jp/~osa-tok ... %A1%A8.pdf

 

http://www.city.setouchi.lg.jp/~osa-tok ... %A3%8F.pdf

 

This is a triple exhibit, held in parallel at Hayashibara Art Museum, Osafune To-ken Hakubutsukan and Seto-uchi City Art Museum.

[Bugyotsuji]

It opens at Osafune tomorrow and runs until Sept 16th. Anyone crazy enough to brave this terrible heat could well enjoy some time in the air-conditioned halls.

 

An interesting concept, they have divided the three museums into past, present and future. (Presumably some visitors will want to travel around and see all three, bringing much needed tourist money into the area?)

 

Well-known graphic artists have been invited to send in large illustrations of their work featuring Japanese swords. Well-known gendai swordsmiths from around Japan and related artisans then set about creating the swords and koshirae featured. In Osafune alone there are fifteen displays, each featuring a cartoon and a written introduction to the work and the artist on the right side of the display, and a sword or two in front with a board on the left side side explaining the sword and the artisans involved in creating the blades and koshirae.

 

As an example here are a sword and kozuka made by Ando Hiroyasu with meteorite iron in the blades.

[Bugyotsuji]

No, although it is a Bizen sword, that is not utsuri!

 

For Ken, a shot with the iPhone showing the blended meteorite iron patterns, more clearly seen above in the kozuka.

[Bugyotsuji]

Here is an illustration of the horned god of the underworld by the famous 開田祐治 Kaida Yuuji, and the Higo Akamatsu Kanemitsu sword, and koshirae they created for it. Kaida Yuuji will appear on Sept 8th (?) holding a signing event for up to 40 people.

[Bugyotsuji]

Loads more, and some very sexy anime ladies, but in the meantime follow the 'character' 刀匠ちゃｎ To-sho Chan! (How many swords?) :D

[Drago]

Aw, she's so cute...

 

We already talked about the Osafune Evangelion exhibition a while ago, this is along similar lines it seems. Does anyone know if there's be an accompanying book like at the Evangelion exhib?

 

Most Nihonto collectors are, by nature, traditionalists so these kinds of exhibtions/undertakings tend to start heated discusssions of tradition vs. modernity. But I have to say, I like it...

[Bugyotsuji]

Tobias, thanks for the feedback.

 

Yes it is their 2013 summer fun follow-up, and yes, there is gold in them thar hills. Maybe they will make collectors out of young women yet! I do not blame anyone who entertains mixed feelings though. They had a guides/volunteers meeting there today which I sort of observed, and there were around 15 fairly elderly sword-knowledgable people cheerfully taking this on.

 

Among the swords on display were some interesting smiths, not least Musashi no Kuniie, the Chairman of the Zen Nohon Tosho Kai, no Kai Cho Sama.

 

Not sure if there will be a booklet. I'll ask.

 

BTW, I hear that the Evangelion one will be travelling, perhaps France, Spain, maybe London?

[DirkO]

Loads more, and some very sexy anime ladies, but in the meantime follow the 'character' 刀匠ちゃｎ To-sho Chan! (How many swords?) :D

 

Is that the famous and rare dai-san-sho ?

[Brian]

If something like this encourages new and young Nihonto enthusiasts...then I am all for it.

 

Brian

[paulb]

said it all before when the last one took place

For once Brian you and I disagree.

I will keep the remainder of my grumpy old git opinions to myself on this one!

[Brian]

That's ok Paul. During Shinto and Shinshinto times, there were also traditionalists rebelling against "fancy" mei and "flashy" hataraki, and blossoms on the hamon and horimono that weren't traditional. Nothing wrong with being a traditionalist (read grumpy old git) :lol:

 

Brian

[Drago]

Not sure if there will be a booklet. I'll ask.

Yes, please do.

 

BTW, I hear that the Evangelion one will be travelling, perhaps France, Spain, maybe London?

Really? Guess I could use what little money I saved for a ticket there...

[Ken-Hawaii]

For Ken, a shot with the iPhone showing the blended meteorite iron patterns, more clearly seen above in the kozuka.

 

Thanks for showing me those, Piers. For those of you who missed it, I sent Ando-san a 1.3 kg nickel-iron meteorite via Piers, based on a conversation we had when my wife & I visited the Bizen-Osafune Sword Village last year. Ando-san had been working on a katana made from a meteorite when we visited, but wanted more material for another blade. The kozuka looks pretty much like what I would expect, but the katana's hada & jigane don't show the high percentage of nickel that I know was in the meteorite. I really want to see those blades in person!

 

Ken

[Bugyotsuji]

Ken, I'll try and get some better shots of the blade for you. In a hurry yesterday. I'll pass on your other questions.

 

*Side note to Brian. Probably browser difference but photos below a certain pixel density, ie from my iPhone show up as photos and say they have been 'opened' 196 times for example, whereas larger 1 mg photos come up only as a clickable line of code and show they have only been clicked on say 7 times in comparison, as the two Devil Tachi shots above. Are some people not being able top open those larger 'hidden' shots, or is there a difference in the click counter, I wonder?

 

PS They are allowing non-flash photography this time.

[John A Stuart]

I'd say, Piers, that a lot of people cruise through pretty fast and if pics aren't immediately visible will skip them. John

[Bugyotsuji]

Interesting, John! A pity as the better quality ones are hidden. From today I will ignore my daughter and go back to taking those good old low res shots again.

[Bugyotsuji]

Tobias, they are producing a booklet, but is not yet ready apparently.

 

I was chatting with some of the people there and picked up some fascinating insights. The Koshirae for Mr Ando's sword probably cost more than the blade itself to make, with every little detail of the tosogu made from scratch by trained artisans. Even the tsuba has swirls in it, showing that it too contains meteorite. Incidentally the amount used in the long blade was reduced to make the patterns less obvious.

 

One Dotanuki-like blade was made by Mikami Sadanao of Aki （with koshirae） to illustrate Koike Kazuo's Kozure Ookami ('Lone Wold and Cub' in the US). The two-volume set of his books were displayed there, with a backdrop of three large panel illustrations by different artists.

 

There was a beautiful katana blade with stunning hamon by Oono Yoshimitsu, with a tsuba-less long black Kenshin goshirae.

 

Oh, and the curator there, Mr Ueno, assured me when I told him about the differences of opinion on this forum, that this is really a fun exhibition, aimed primarily at the young for the summer vacation.

[Brian]

Interesting, John! A pity as the better quality ones are hidden. From today I will ignore my daughter and go back to taking those good old low res shots again.

Piers,

I have mentioned before...the max size before images are a link instead of showing directly is 1200 x 1200. It isn't about hi-res or not..just image size.

I don't want to waste peoples bandwidth by having 5 meg pictures load slowly and forcing scrolling when not necessary.

 

Btw...your one image was 1280x960....so you only had to resize a teeeny little bit (80 pixels less width) to allow it to display.

And I find people never check their own posts, then go back and edit them.

Easy for anyone to check your post..decide you want images rather to display directly...resize them and edit your post. Delete each pic...re-upload. I do it all the time

 

This is 2013. Everyone needs to know how to at least do basic picture resizing and editing.

 

Brian

[Bugyotsuji]

Only size!

 

Aw Brian, thanks for the pick-me-up. Just feeling sorry for myself, I was.

[Bugyotsuji]

Interestingly on weekends they run all kinds of parallel workshops to take advantage of the exhibition. Today there was a special introduction in the lecture hall for members of the public interested in Kansho/Kantei and how to hold a Nihonto, etc. The speaker asked how many had heard through Twitter about this opportunity and almost everyone raised their hands. There were perhaps thirty newcomers seated there.

 

He showed some Powerpoint slides on the possible roles of Nihonto, how they are made and what to look for in the steel. Once they had the background information, he gave them a break and told them to wash their hands and get ready to remove bags and jewellery! There were five blades laid out representing easily recognisable styles, for example San-bon-sugi from Seki, Choji from Bizen, and Kikusui from Osaka. A lot of women in the group, and everyone quite friendly, respectful and mannerly.

 

Next Sunday they will have several sets of old smelly armour for people to helped on with and have their photos taken. I have helped with these sessions before and you can get hundreds of people in one day. Backbreaking work. Gradually you get to be able to do a young lady in about a minute and a half. Kneel and fit her Sune-ate round her shins and haidate round her waist. On with her Kote and then Doh breast plate, and wind her and bind her tight. Stick a sword through the mawashi, fit a hair bag and slap on the Kabuto... voila! They love it! :D

[Tcat]

Wow... I love the look of this exhibition and have been daydreaming about designing/planning/curating one in a similar vain for years. Not quite as much anime in mine but Still...this is really encouraging and we ought to be seeing a lot more of these kinds of exhibition - helping to bring the arts back to the forefront of (young) peoples minds. There I am daydreaming again..I'll shut up now. Seriously though...this looks so awesome.

[Bugyotsuji]

Refreshing to see your reaction Alex.

 

The whole 15 display exhibition is only offered in Japanese. Stupidly, I offered to translate their visitor exhibition guide for them into English and just spent the weekend doing it.

[Bugyotsuji]

As explained above, this is a cooperative event between three venues, so today with a free ticket in hand I took the opportunity to see how the Hayashibara Museum of Art in Okayama City are holding up their end of things. The museum is set within part of the former grounds of the castle and incorporates one of the old gates as its entrance.

 

On display was an eclectic mix of historically and artistically interesting pieces. A cute and colourful set of Ikeda lady's armour. A marvellous see-through summer Jimbaori. Kawari-kabuto and a huge dragonfly maedate. Relics of Ikeda Tsuneoki who with his son was killed at the battle of Nagakute (1584), kept by the Tottori Ikeda branch. Several swords of interest including an Unsho tachi and a Kokuho Masamune tanto with koshirae that the museum is alleged to have purchased for 200,000,000 JPY. The anime wall panels were simply extra eye candy.

 

More, but it's been a long day and I need to sleep!

 

(Now I have the last of their three folders these places are handing out for the summer joint exhibition!) :D

[Brian]

Would love to hear more about that Masamune....

 

Brian

[Bugyotsuji]

Your wish is my command! :lol:

[Curran]

Thank you for the mental food.

I have little knowledge of manga, but appreciate the display and imagination of those who breathed life into it.

[Bugyotsuji]

Curran, yesterday I had the fortune to attend a lecture given by the author of Lone Wolf and Cub, Koike Kazuo and he was discussing this subject. He said that swords can take on new life and meaning in the popular imagination if they are associated with a character, or characters. He called it getting the right hormones flowing. The blade Excalibur comes alive with the story of Arthur, he said. Dotanuki took popular hold when he chose it for his hero, and nowadays many people use the spelling "Do 太 nuki" he created in his story in place of the real spelling "Do 田 nuki".

 

I thought of Hattori Hanzo in Kill Bill, and some of the Muramasa legends, but kept my mouth shut.

 

He told an amazing tale of travelling to the world Anime/Manga SDCC Comic-Con gathering in San Diego with the swordsmith Mikami of Hiroshima, carrying the specially-boxed 'Dotanuki' sword. They were stopped at customs and despite having all the proper documentation to carry it legally they were surrounded by security and taken to a special room where they struggled for more than an hour to explain what they were doing with this Samurai sword. Luckily they had a copy of the English version of the book and after many efforts of saying Rohn Ulf, they saw a spark of recognition in one of the security officers' eyes. Suddenly everyone was surrounding them for group photos and asking them for their signatures and things went smoothly from then on.

[Lance]

Any chance you took some pictures of the Lone wolf and Cub display and sword?

(that's me begging)

 

Regards,

Lance

[Bugyotsuji]

Three artists, one sword. In the camera I can find one bigger shot, Lance, taken before his book was placed in there...

 

He used to write and have the illustrations done for him, so his series was always a cooperative work.

[Bugyotsuji]

And then some smaller shots... :|