Aoi Art Kantei

[Ted Tenold]

Now, this kantei was sheer luck, because I did it on gut feeling. though I have seen/hold some swords by him.

 

You're just being modest Jean. A clear hit is a clear hit and you did it with conviction from the start, so kudos clearly earned and in order. "Luck" favors the prepared. :D You were so prepared in that you have seen prior works by the smith and thus listened to the input your brain had already cataloged. This is the essence of kantei and Atari for you.

 

In fact, it seems that first straight answer can lead to a good kantei. Too much analysis can lead to wrong kantei

 

My point (and mea culpa ), exactly. I did overthink it after my initial first impression of "Sue Soshu". I should have listened to and expanded on that impression instead of literally walking myself down the kaido to Suruga province to receive a Tori Yoku answer. First impressions should be listened to very closely because they come straight from brain without much (or any) additional processing. If your first snap shot impression of the sword was "HuH????", well then "blind" guessing would be accurate.

 

Fusamune bids earn a respectable Dozen and are very very close.

 

Kunihiro bids are a bit confusing to me because he straddles the Koto/Shinto periods as well as provinces. Would he be Kuni Iri Yoku (correct province) or a Jidai Chigai Yoku (different period same province) call? Maybe Paul can explain/expand on this for us.

 

What you have to ask yourself now Jean is what did you really learn from being "correct"? My point on this is really not directed at you, Jean, as much as everyone who hesitates to take a stand with a call. It's far better to try and be wrong than remain on the sidelines with apprehension. Certainly sometimes this includes guessing in the lack of any real instinctive response. But in kantei there are no penalties and certainly anyone that would chastise another's incorrect answer truely is without understanding of the entire exercise. A friend of mine once gave me some advice concerning kantei; "Make lots of mistakes, you learn much more from being wrong than when you are right". This is quite true. When you are right in kantei, it's more or less a lesson already learned. We explore deeper when we are wrong (or at least we should) and thus learn a great deal more. When we are right, we rarely hit the books again to figure out why we got it right, so learning more or less stops there.

 

Keith Larman turned me on to a facinating book on the subject of first impressions called Blink, by Malcolm Gladwell. It addresses this very phenomenon which is a very powerful tool for kantei.

 

http://www.amazon.com/Blink-Power-Think ... 0316172324

 

Congrats Jean and Brian, who settled onto a Tsunahiro bid as well, for your direct hits!

[Jean]

Hi Ted,

 

Thanks for your post and to answer your question I am going to tell you that I have learnt nothing from this Kantei. Because no explanation was given with the answer and as already stated the Horimono are clearcly out ot his usual ones.

 

The only thing I was confirmed in and I refer to late Jim Kurrash who was a master in this fiels is that kantei is very difficult exercise.

 

I have not this article but if a NMB member has it please post it.

 

The article was named: "Kantei is easy".

 

To be brief, nothing must be taken for face value, there are no rules only trends.

[Paul Martin]

I think Kudos to all who made an attempt, particularly Jean and Brian. Despite Jean's comments I think it is most definitely down to that fact that as Jean said, he has held and viewed some of his works, no luck about it experience counts and that you (Jean ) have learned that you can recognize Tsunahiro even from a photo. Eric's kantei was also excellent, also obviously had contact with a few of this schools works to be so confident.

 

I have seen quite a few Kunihiro, ranging from hada like the one posted, nie-deki, to well forged examples and even Rai-ustushi-mono. My personal mistakes were: 1, I didn't read the hints (ie.saki-zori) and just looked at the photograph. 2. After seeing some rather shallow sujikai yasurime on some Kunihiro, I ignored the fact of the kiri-yasurime and Jean's concerns of them. 3. Ignored my own concerns of the nakago-jiri, and went off on a whim about the horimono.

 

However, even though I know the result, the overall shape, feeling of period and feeling of the piece still reminds me of Kunihiro. It starts out with a small yakidashi like piece and gradually builds up along the blade and kinda climaxes in the mono-uchi/kissaki area. I have only seen one Fusamune and it was the tanto in the Boston Catalogue, with a very differently cut horimono and (probably due to the polish and photography) the hamon seemed rather different also. Tsunahiro, I have seen one some years ago, and do not remember much about it. Thus, having these in your hands for study means something.

 

Kantei is an excellent learning process that cannot be beat. At the end of the day Kantei like this is a learning tool, a game if you will. So the next step for all those of us who did not get atari will now probably go and study up further on Tsunahiro, Fusamune and Shimada school and improve your skills for next time. Which apart from enjoying the swords is the point of the kantei game.

 

In the simplified rules of Kantei-nyusatsu, Kunhiro (which interestingly got the most amount of votes--even after the result ) would likely be Jidai chigai, iya--wrong period wrong province, because everyone accepts for Kantei-nyusatsu that he was a Keicho smith based in Horikawa. Fusamune - douzen, correct school and close to the actual smith, Yoshisuke (Gisuke) Tori correct period and road. Heian-jo Nagayoshi- iya, Correct period wrong province.

(*Rules and opinions vary slightly depending on kantei-kai and/or judge)

 

However, as kantei-rules are for the game, they do not reflect the closeness of everyones guesses they are only a guide. I think that no-one made any drastic mistakes. The biggest problem doing kantei like this is peoples pride at having to display their best guess in front of the world (hence the lack of participation). In Japan, only the judge knows your answers and in most kantei-kai they use the sanbon-nyusatsu system (three guesses) to which you get hints (ie. iya, yoku, tori etc) which adds to your learning curve.

 

Best

[Jean]

Afterthought :

 

Concerning the Tsunahiro, one thing noticeable in the given hint is that there are tobiyaki. These one are hardly visible on the pictures but if you look at the oshigata they appear with a crescent form which is typical of Sue Soshu, the other schools (Mino, Bizen ..) using roundish tobiyaki.

 

Here is a very good picture taken by Big Mo of Soshu Tsunahiro Hitatsura where some crescent tobiyaki can be easily distinguished :

 

http://www.nihontoantiques.com/gallery.htm

 

There are other blades of Hiromasa with good horimono or hitatsura