chaos and sleeplessness

Only two days to go and complete exhaustions as I try and make it all happen. Thanks to Kate and Hanako for the rescue last night.

But still pausing to photograph fashionistas:

A bike gang Tokyo style: Yoyogi

Install Shibuya.

Today- wonderful Spring

I am so behind on blogging what’s going on- and with how my work is developing. Work has really started to take over – which is great, but I am so used to not talking to people and reflecting publicly about my work, I keep not writing about the questions I am asking myself and which I would actually like to talk to people about…anyway…

Bec, Lisa and Anneka have been here for a live art showcase organised by the British Council, has been really nice to see people from home. We have caught a few times for dinner and today after the conference was over we went to see a few shows. We spent most of the day at the Hara Art Mueusm and the Yang Fudong exhibition.

Yang Fudong had the series "Seven Intellectuals in a Bamboo Forest" parts 1 to 4 in the 2007 Venice Biennale (If I remember right it was 4 parts). I enjoyed seeing the work on that occasion although did not watch them all the way through as each is an hour long. I felt then, and it was the same feeling on seeing his work again, that there must be another layer of narrative and symbolism that is not accessible for me, not knowing much about China and its history and language. It was good to see his work in a focus exhibition and see the development of his use of the film form and his concerns about the massive social changes occurring in China. His later works have become really long marathons, the new work the "General’s Smile" is a multi- channel installation that you would need to spend an hour in to get through everything, and each part of Seven Intellectuals is an hour long. However I feel that the earliest work in the show “Backyard- Hey! Sun is rising” was the easiest to enter and had some of the imagery and qualities, as well as the same actors that appear in later works. This is a Black and White 35mm film that has a fracture and surreal narrative, with repeated actions such as the four men in a small room yawning, running through a garden with swords like is stylised battle scenes from Chinese cinema and stalking each other along the street. The sound track was a bamboo flute that accentuated the distance of the viewer from the action and added to the playful humour. Because his work was shorter it was easier to deal with this fractured narrative and parts that where less readable as there was still a sense of the work as a whole.

Because we are old friends we didn’t think to take pictures of each other in Tokyo- so here we are walking away from the very photogenic Hara Art Museum gardens (postcard top).

Today had the feeling of Spring, warm clear skies after a month of grey... I just checked the weather though and we are back to grey and cold for the rest of the week- not good for filming or fuji viewing...

pattern love

The combinations of pattern and decoration here fascinate me. The most interesting examples are in fashion and ceramics, especially the combinations in kimono outfits.

Hiroko (top two photos) is one the fashionistas of the art scene I find myself in (which means I assume there are many art scenes and I know I have not seen many of them). The top photo is from an Åbäke event last Sunday. The jacket is one she bought as a student in the 80’s- it’s a bone gabardine with heavy hot pink screen-printed design- no label. The skirt would not have been one I would have chosen but I can see how it fits with the aesthetic here.

The second photo is of her wearing a very interesting scarf. The green spotted fabric is shear voile, and the yellow, green brown check is soft wool. Again two patterns you don’t normally see together- spots and checks, and two fabrics that are not a usual match- the light weight voile with a medium weight wool. It works though.

The bottom two photos are of a lovely lady I meet in the second hand kimono store on Aoyama Dori, which is the main road out in front of the residency. I went in two weeks ago after a particularly frustrating encounter trying to buy a ticket and hotel to Hakone. It was the right thing to do to put me back into the positive connections you can make in Tokyo.

It seemed to me that although she was dressed very traditionally that her energy made the kimono very contemporary. I went in and had a look around, and as I was leaving I took a second look at a jacket. She encouraged me to put it on and then when I pointed out an especially beautiful kimono, but said I would not buy it because it need to be worn for what it was created: a coming of age celebration; not to be cut up to be more conventionally worn in a western country. She agreed but said I should try it on so she could take my picture in it- Very nice! She chose an interesting obi with a lot of gold thread work. I asked how the choices where made- what patterns go with what? She found it hard to answer and she it took a while to understand it, that beginners make mistakes.

She asked me where I was from and when I told her Australia- she said ah summer! And that she wanted to go to Australia to go surfing. She said look at my tan line- and held out her wrist pointing to where her full body wet suit ended. Japanese can be so cool.

Tien-en hiking course: Kamakura

I started the day at Kenchoji (the last picture), which is the oldest Zen temple in Kamakura and an impressive wooden temple complex. The trail started up behind the temple climbing steeply straight away via a long sequence of stairs to a temple which had a lookout to view towards Fuji-san. As you can see the day was pretty clouded over and I only got glimpses of the very base at points during the day. It was also very windy making recording hard. I have found that the weather forcast changes pretty rapidly here with what is predicted for tomorrow in the evening being different to what was said in the morning. Rain was forecast for Friday- that is why I had headed out of town on Wednesday and Thursday. It held off till I got to Zuisenji (first picture) and then started to rain, making me head off before I wanted to really. Zuisenji is the oldest original garden in Kamakura and was filled with ancient blossom trees that needed to be propted up. It poured the whole way back to town and meant I took pretty straight route and didn’t see that many temples.

The hike was a good long walk with some steep climbing. It was mostly through deciduous forests, so lots of bare trees and then cedar (?) or some kind of pine (?) in the shaded gullies (4th from top- for Felicity and Lyndon). I love the straight trunks that don’t get foliage till near the top. The hike got a bit confusing in places with many trails cris-crossing and after a while the English directions disappeared from the signs, after about half way. Also I only saw about 10 other people on this walk over 5 hours. Some serious runners in special gear and other wanders like myself. It was a really nice change to be out and alone and will be a good place to make some recording on a less windy day.

The trail gave fantastic panoramic views of the coast (which photos don’t quiet capture), and that coast view with the space of the ocean made me think of home and I thought about lots of people as I walked along. The shrine cave above is one in a group in an area which where empty (there where lots of little ones along the walk) and made me think of Sarah doing an installation there. The camellia’s are for Haico; I understand the way he prune trees after seeing the gardens in Kamakura.

Of course half way back to Tokyo it cleared and the sky cleared as I passed Yokohama and I got a view of Fuji-san from base to top, much like the blue evening view the day before.

More shots here on flickr