Muqi Persimmons

Taking an easter break so here's Mu Qi's Persimmons to look at!

Kanji In Sydney

A sydney ramen shop

WA VERSUS OR PLUS KARA

WHICH IS IT?

Writers on Japanese aesthetics tend to discuss the relationship of Japanese and Chinese culture in binary terms perhaps influenced bythe Taoist  yin yang concept?  (INYO in Japanese)

Wa features in words like waka and wabun but WA itself is an ON reading of the word thats HO in Modern Mandarin though judging from the ON reading , Chinese dialects, and the form in Sino Vietnamese and Korean, the original pronunciation was something more like * hwa ?

Look at these words WA NIHONGA Tosa Yamato Rimpa Waka Haiku 

Contrast them and their styles to KARA TANG ZEN SUIBOKU  KANO Bujinga

Think of the differences between Mino ceramic styles and Celadon like Imari ?

The Kano school of painting certainly shows a strong influence of Chinese Monochrome painting in contrast to TOSA-E but Rimpa and the later Nihonga schools Japanese as they are still show Chinese influences. 

Waka and Haiku poets while writing in Japanese were often also scholars and teachers of confucianism or chinese literature.

Bujinga the scholar's style has a playful joyous  approach to color that might have shocked some Chinese artists apart from those of the eccentrics group?

So called  ZEN painting and related Suiboku monochromes using ink with no color  ultimately derive from Chinese works brought to Japan by Buddhist monks.

Perhaps its not so much a binary opposition but a binary interplay?

The Mother of Lightning

#taoist #lightning #goddess #image

Those familiar with e male gods of Thunder and Lightning may find this image of interest?

The Mother of Lightning is a Taoist goddess.

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the claw radical 87

copyright julie vaux 2013

I decided to do this one cos it has two variant forms when it appears at the top of a character. There is one more variant with a hook on the middle vertical stroke but my computer refuses to generates that character.

Who are my readers!?

Who are my readers ?

According to the blog stats most of you if you're not AIs or searchbots are from the USA followed by Russia Germany and parts of Europe oh and none from mainland China kind which is probably due to their firewall.

That makes me kinda sad. I'ld love to get feedback from people who are far more fluent in Asian languages than me?

My Stats claim most of my few Asian readers are in South Korea or Malaysia?

So who are you?

Nuka is NOT Chun

This is a followup to my Kang and Nuka Post.

Nuka often looks like CHUN but it is NOT.

Its more feldspathic than Chun and than there's the rice bran as an ingredient for the silica thing.

Yes I can hear some ceramicist saying but it looks a lot like Chun?

Take a close look. See how it runs in streaks .

Chun tends to be denser and cloudier.

Okay these 2 small bowls have oxide splashes on them but can you see the difference?

Just to complicate things there's another Chinese glaze called Shiwan which fires at lower temperatures like NUKA and I have found you can get similar effects to Shiwan and Nuka firing a speckled pattern created with underglazes in two different colors of blue light and dark under Chun.

To further complicate things  whehter a vessel is wood rather than gas fired can also effect the glaze.

NUKA is Japanese.

Chun originated in Song China.

I hope to firing some Chun vessels later this year After I have resolved problems with course cancellations and changes to pricing at TAFE and problems with finding a day elsewhere if I can get into WAC that does not clash with living an elderly relative in a aged care facility.

More later this year

Ceramics is as much a part of Asian culture as Calligraphy.

Coming soon a series on Ancient Chinese Bronzes.

Do the characters used to write their names tell us anything about them?

Kang and Nuka

Copyright Julie Vaux 2013

Another of my posts explaining the names of various ceramic glazes.

With NUKA you can sometimes get chun like effects at lower firing temperatures.

Green Crocodile

Copyright Julie Vaux 2013 

I tried to get a texture that suggests the rough hide of a crocodile.

Not quite there?

E crocodile

Copyright Julie Vaux 2013

While the phonetic looks like a scale pattern I do wonder if Dongson drums could have been an influence?

Crocodiles can be noisy during mating season .

I like the way the modern form suggests a crocodile's eyes and tail .

Ai Haze

Copyright Julie Vaux 2013

What I wish we had today instead of all this heavy rain!

The fonts are Segoe and SimHei