#8 Dou
Overview
The theme is “Dou ‒ the way of beauty”. Shodou (calligraphy), kadou (flower arrangement), sadou (tea ceremony), kidou, kendou (Japanese fencing), judou, kyudou (Japanese archery)…. Most of the Japanese art and martial art use the term, “dou”. “Dou” expresses the way to live, the life itself. It is the aesthetic that leads to the Zen philosophy. In the long history, more conservative philosophies have become more popular. However, some people say that the Japanese art was full of dynamism for life. This time, the visual arts were created by incorporating this dynamism into Shodou, Kadou, and Sadou.
Shodou
There must be only a small number of people who would deny the relationships between words and calligraphy. The calligraphers have been wondering “What are words?” As if going against the exploration of calligraphers, the affluent modern society with abundance of things has been affirming the importance of words. In the modern society where a variety of communication platforms such as 2 channel, blog, and twitter exist, it is extremely important to capture the words accurately. Now, the fairy of letters is sounding an alarm to the world of human beings who are not treating words
carefully. What does it mean to treat the words carefully? I visualized an image clad in words.
Created by
Kinya Ota ( Photograph ) Kotaro Hachinohe ( Calligraphy ) Naho Sawada ( Hair and Makeup ) Natsuko Kanno ( Styling ) Yoshitaka Mori ( Video ) Yugo Funaki ( Music ) Atsushi Kaneishi ( Web ) Hitoshi Sagaseki ( Creative Direction )
Kadou
The flower arrangement is an art originated from Japan. However, nowadays, it is internationally appreciated. The flower arrangement not only uses colorful flowers but also skillfully takes into account the forms of the branches and stems. The flower arrangement and makeup (traditional Japanese makeup) have many common points such as designing a structure using points, lines and plane based on their movement, rhythm and balance and developing a basis. For example, the Kabuki makeup called “kumadori” uses lines effectively. The red lines express the “justice”, “courage”, brawny muscle, and boiling of blood vessels (enthusiasm). This time, while focusing on the lines, I depicted a spontaneous and beautiful woman’s figure in the lively and lean lines of plants.
Created by
Kimio Takeyama ( Photograph ) Kamami ( Model ) Setsuko Suzuki ( Hair and Makeup ) Akiyo Sano ( Ikebana ) Sho Momma ( Video ) Kyoko Takeyama ( Retouch ) Atsushi Kaneishi ( Web ) Hitoshi Sagaseki ( Creative Direction )
Sadou
With the tea ceremony they say that there is a “universe” in a teacup. In the tea ceremony’s spirit, which has incorporated a zen philosophy, there is a dualistic thinking of “Things do not appear and they do not disappear. They exist but do not exist. ” Through a teacup, one can feel the vision of “one world” before feeling “the second world” of this dualistic thinking, namely, a space beyond the bounds of concept (extraordinary space = universe). By using the teacup, I expressed another universe from a new perspective.
Created by
Masami Adachi ( Photograph and Video) Rie Nishimura ( Painting ) Sho Momma ( Video ) Steve Chen ( Video ) Kenji Williams ( Music ) Atsushi Kaneishi ( Web ) Hitoshi Sagaseki ( Creative Direction )