HAGI STYLIZED

#hagi #bushclover #japaneseart #japaneselacquer

I've seen Hagi - Bush Clover represented in a variety of stylized ways so here's what it actually looks like compared to its rendering in 3 different media

However on lacquer 

and on a print 

finally a painting 

The September theme is ...

September #Kigo

Which of the Seven Autumn Plant is draped over this Wild boars back?
Which plant tops the list and features in waka and haiku as far back as the Manyoshu ?

HAGI 

Hagi also known as Lespedeza and Bush Clover is the September theme !

Kawase Hasui's Lotus Pond

#KawaseHasui #Hasui #shinhanga #japaneseprints

Some people regard Hasui's works as sentimental or sweet or merely charming so I want to tell you a short story about him. His family at first willn't let him study art, Western or traditional, but he finally as an adult got training in both and went to work for a company that supported the #ShinHanga style.

During the Great Kanto Quake most of his sketch books and the wooden printing blocks for all the major series he had done so far were destroyed. Hundreds of images of pre Quake Tokyo and Japan lost!

What did he do?

He got new sketch books as soon as possible and created a new series from memory and observation.

His work once dismissed as catering for tourists and nostalgia is more popular now.

Toyohiro Summer Painting

#toyohiro #japanesepainting #summer 

For those of you enduring the northern hemisphere summer this is the right season to share Toyohiro's famous work:
Enjoying the Evening Cool Under a Trellis

The bottle is probably earthenware clay and perhaps full of sake?

Both of them seem to be glancing up at the sky maybe not admiring the white flowers but hoping to see signs of evening rain? 

Surimono Still life Shunman

#surimono #stilllife #ukiyo-e #japaneseprint #shunman #shumman

Here's a print by Shunman showing Lotus stems and Ginger plus a Lobster or Shrimp
All of which were edible but also had other cultural significance.

It seems very minimal and sketchy compared to the lust detailed still-lifes of European art but the limited color and detail on the plant stems seems to be a delibarate choice to emphasize the areas of greater detail and color. Visual wabi sabi ? Or even poetic elegance given the accompanying poems.

Another Bumping Sunday

People I'll in ...well on my bed cos I have to alternate short hobbles in an aircast boot with raising or at least supporting the weight of my right leg.
(Stable fracture of right distal fibula)
And I can't go outside cos the current weather is making my chronic bronchitis flare up
(Lots of windswept dust n pollen)
posts to this blog or my Patreon will be irregular so today I ask
Will you join me in bumping and sharing older posts  ?
Thank You

Harunobu Print

#Harunobu #print

Girls gathering waterlilies or water lotuses is a theme that appears in a variety of literature and art.
Here's Harunobu's treatment of the topic. Some Ukiyo-e artists depict a whole pond of lotus or just the plants and flowers but Harunobu balances both the human element of the girls in a boat with the simple beauty of the plants themselves. It is not an elaborately colored print but has a simple elegance that lets the lines work.

Take a good look at the composition too.The balance of horizationals and verticals.

 The contrast of straight stems with the round curve of leaves and sleeves and obi.