Phoenix on Tea Caddy

 #Japanese #lacquer is an unceasing source of Delight 

This is the lid of a tea caddy. Such exquisite craft and design !

Have a good Christmas people 

Kano Tanshin - Phoenix Screen

 #KanoTanshin #Kano #phoenix #whitephoenix #screenpainting #japanesepainting 

In the 18th century in Japan there are several paintings featuring White rather than Five Colored Phoenixes. I suspect the reasons for this are printed books showing Phoenixes as outline drawings, imported chinese or other east asian monochrome ceramics, and the influence of minimal aesthetics valuing the concept of reduced colors.

Here's one example. This is the middle two screens of a six screen painting.

The white is probably a mineral pigment and stands out all the more given the muted restrained use of colors as highlights on the rest of the set of screens.

This is Kano but you can  see how Kano influenced Rimpa and how both influenced later Nihonga works?

 

Korean Phoenix Vase

#Korean #phoenix #vase #ceramics #asianceramics #koreanceramics

 

This is not as elaborately detailed as some Chinese and Japanese depictions but it has grace and lightness and lines that curve with beauty across the surface of the vessel. 

It really shows the beauty of using cobalt pigment in place of ink !

More phoenixes next time! 

Hokusai's Phoenix Painting

 Hokusai's Phoenix Painting 

#hokusai #phoenix 

While Hokusai is best known as a print designer he did also paint !

I have shared this one before but as this is one of his lesser known works I wanted to share it so more people can enjoy it !

Persia and China and a Phoenix

Okay since I was sick double posts to make up for my absence today!

Some of you may already know about the interactions of China and the Islamic world via ceramics.

Sancai and later blue and white ware and polychrome ceramics were developed partly in response to imports from Mesopotamia of lead glazed earthenware polychrome and later  Iznik ware was partly a response to imports of  Chinese blue and white wares.

Another example of how the interaction went both ways is this #Ilkhanid #phoenix #ceramic #tile

The rhythm and layout is very Chinese but note the Islamic influence on the floral ornaments !

No culture exists in isolation.

Is this "cultural appropriation" or interchange and fusion?

More Lacquer- Chinese POLYCHROME

Having shown you several Japanese lacquer works I thought it time to show you some different styles.

This may be either colored lacquer over carved wood or a combination of carved wood and carved lacquer.

It's #chineselacquer a beautiful #phoenix and #qing dynasty #kangxi reign.

This was sold recently on an auction site and I have no idea who now owes it but happily the image was still online!

Its a lovely work! The photo makes me wish I could inspect the original!

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A HOKUSAI MEDLEY

#Hokusai is well known for his landscape prints and his famous #Manga sketchbooks but he was also a painter and designer of surimono prints. 

#surimono #japaneseprints #ukiyo-e #phoenix

I've shared 2 of his lesser known surimono prints and in the middle is part of a screen painting of a phoenix for contrast.

I have used this one a few times before as as well as being a well designed print it shows traditional asian brushes,an inkstone, and a block of ink. 

This is a detail of a 8 fold screen set of paintings probably used in a bedroom.

Japaneses prints had a variety of formats.

Surimono often feature long horizontal formats as they were frequently folded into pamphlets and given as newyear gifts.

More Hokusai soon! 

I'll try to find some unusual images that illustrate all aspects of his work.

Pictographs and Words as Pictures and Phoenixes

#Pictographs and Words as Pictures and #Phoenixes

This imperfect image comes after some editing from a textbook of chinese characters showing six types of Chinese Script

yes I know I missed a few spots and probably deleted too much and the eraser tool on one character  ...

for some reason the scripts are aligned oddly two forms of seal script then li shu then xing then regular then full cao frankly if I had been doing the layout I would have shown kai modern simplified then cao and xing then on the right li and the two archaic forms.

However imperfect as the image and my editing was (its an old file form when I'd had less practice with a eraser tool) it does give some idea of the progression from pictograph to ideogram over the centuries.

So is the "word" a picture even in a modern form?

An Asian or other scholar educated in calligraphy and radicals would see a tail and head under the vault of heaven in all the forms and a calligrapher might state the cursive form is both a picture and a word representing the phoenix in flight

I suspect someone being exposed to chinese scripts for the first time if asked which they think is a phoenix would pick the second character from the right ?

Which would you?

More playing with Phoenixs

I've been playing with filter combos in #inkscape and this time with the #Feng #phoenix trying to craft a combo that doesn't obscure the characteristic and also suggests skies and fragrant breezes and rainbows.

I know some people loather rainbow filters and think they're kitsch but for me they sometimes have synaesthetic effects.

Or is that hypocrisy? Is it only okay for trendy famous male contemporary artists who live in Beijing to play with #hanzi. At least mine are legible. Yes grass or other scripts rendered with a  brush ink and paper are beautiful but ... readability?

Copyright Julie Vaux 2015

 I'm in Sydney but I wish I was in say ... Japan ... enjoying the colors of autumn leaves ...

4 Phoenixes

Copyright Julie Vaux 2015

More Phoenixes! I've included the Unicode so if you don't like this font you can use the code to generate svgs in a different font.

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Or PATREON PLEDGE ME

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The Female Phoenix HUANG

Copyright Julie Vaux 2015

Here are 4 font variations of the #hanzi / #kanji  for Huang

the Feng Phoenix's Consort and the word in a few dialects and languages.

Femme Phoenix One

Copyright Julie Vaux 2015

The next Technozi sequence will be about Phoenixes.

The Male Feng has a Consort the Huang.

I am now on Etsy

Would anyone be interested in seeing or even buying a PDF album of some of my most popular technozi  which would include instructions on how I craft them? 

Phoenix Technozi

Copyright Julie Vaux 2012

Yinand Yang Dragon and Phoenix
My next sequence will feature the Phoenix .
This image is modified from a png I created of a seal script form of Feng.