Wow have I been negligent lately. It’s not that I haven’t been working on art… I have. So many things have been hovering in the planning stages that I really didn’t feel safe to write about them just yet. Happily, my schemes are starting to solidify.
Take, for example, my most upcoming of exhibitions: 風雷貌 (ふうらいぼう) Fuuraibou at Gallery G2 in Ginza, Tokyo. It’ll run from July 22 thru the 31st. There will be more to say about the show soon, after I figure out a good English translation for the title. Until then, mark your calendars.
In the previous blog entry, I mentioned that I was working on the biggest, wackiest piece I’ve done yet. Well, it’s 99.99% done. Just one last piece to glue down. The catch is, it’s so darn big that it won’t fit on my scanner. Yeah, usually I have to scan my artwork in two or three (or four) parts, then mosaic them together in Photoshop. And it’s a royal pain in the neck. This one is so big, it’s gonna take at least 6 or 8 scans, I think. And I’m just dreading it. Getting all the lines to line up, forcing the colors to match, zipping around and erasing all the miniscule dust particles… the thought alone makes me shudder. It won’t be as detailed, but I’m trying to eke out a good photo, and will post it as soon as I can.
In the meantime, I thought I would share a little bit of the inspiration that drove this whale of a piece. Cherry blossoms! In April, just walking to the shop for milk turns romantic as the sakura petals fall all around you. This year, they even hung on the trees for a couple days before being obliterated by torrential rains. The dark and twisted trunks of the older trees are a fascinating contrast to the delicacy of the blossoms. You can see a few more on Facebook.
Oh yeah, and here’s a Work In Progress. All the bits and pieces before being conjured and cobbled and puzzled together. Can you figure out what this will become?
I’ve been trying to work on a slightly larger scale recently. It gives me a chance to tell more complicated stories with more subtle emotions and concepts. Not to mention that some of the papers I’ve picked up recently are just too beautiful to slice apart. Take, for example, the background paper in this piece. The deep blend of colors mixed with the gold ink is just stunning in person. It’s really a piece of art unto itself.
Or the subtle variations in color in the beastly blue.
Finally, here’s the scribble I worked off of. The concept popped into my head more or less fully formed, but with an entirely different cast of inappropriate characters. By this time, I had revised them to their near-finished state. The big hands on the mount’s front limbs were a late addition. It’s surprising how much intelligence those opposable thumbs add to a creature; they make all the difference between a beast of burden and a sentient creature. 
size: 8 x 10”
“Baby Powder” Takidaira Jiro, 1974
