Textile Craftsman or Artist? 職人さん？それとも作家さん？

Late last year I had some interesting conversations and encounters that kept bringing up the question of art/craft relating to textiles. 

When I was in Kanazawa late last November. I happened to visit Nagamachi Yuzen-kan, a Yuzen atelier, display room and giftshop headed by Teranishi Ikko. I only ended up there by chance after seeing a sign on a corner in the old Samurai Residence district that mentioned "Yuzen". (hooray for being able to read Kanji!) While I was there, I mentioned to the gallery assistant that I am studying yuzen and she hurried off to introduce me to Teranishi-san who kindly sat down and had a cup of tea and a chat with me about all things Kaga-yuzen (a variation of yuzen unique to the Kanazawa area).

dyeing work in progress at Nagamachi Yuzen-kan

Teranishi-san’s business card reads Kaga Yuzen Artist, although his approach to his work is fundamentally as a craftsman. His atelier used to have 30 or 40 assistants working in the various stages of Kaga Yuzen kimono production but with the shift away from traditional kimono culture, he now has only a few assistants and mainly creates Kimono for individual orders. He puts great importance on technique and has even published two textbooks on Kaga Yuzen techniques and principles for students and those who entered his studio as apprentices. 

Room full of Teranishi-san's kimono at Nagamachi Yuzen-kan

In listening to what he had to say it was apparent that he doesn't think much of those putting an artistic bent on Kaga Yuzen.  He said something like “Self-expression doesn’t really serve any purpose in the real world”. This seemed a rather sad thought to me. That is, he places value in well executed, useable and classically beautiful Kaga Yuzen, as opposed to individualistic kimono made for competitive exhibitions or to advance the name of particular maker. In this sense you could say he typifies the Japanese shokunin-san (craftsman)

Unlike Kyoto-style Yuzen which can tend toward traditional patterns and elaborate decoration, Kaga-yuzen is known for the realistic depiction of flowers and plants, based upon strong observation and drawing skills. In Japanese, this is called shassei, the kanji of which mean to copy life 「写生」. It seems to me that this is quite an ‘Art’ based practice.

Kaga-yuzen places emphasis on sketching from life and observation

 Teranishi-san described the point of shassei nicely,

"There is nothing pointless in Nature. Everything faces toward the sun, reaching up from the roots. Thick parts are thick; there are leaves that shrivel up with the seasons, the ways that leaves extend outwards...all of these are part of Japanese visual tradition and patterns. But you don't draw these by imitating existing patterns, you go and sketch nature yourself... In a photograph, the beauty of nature is captured as is. But there's absolutely nothing interesting about a drawing that's exactly like a photograph."

To Teranishi-san, true art is found in nature and the craftsman is reproducing it, try as he might with inaccuracies, and this is his craft. In Teranishi-san’s view, however, the Yuzen maker is not simply replicating or modifying old patterns but sketching from nature with intent and modifying what they see, 

"In an art drawing or painting, the artist's inability is always somewhat present. But that's not really inability. A true lack of ability is to leave everything up to nature. In our dyeing and craft fields, we may study and study all we like but we will never measure up to nature; that inadequacy always remains. But...that inability, that simplicity, that's a really precious thing."

detail of a noren set by Teranishi-san with energetic motifs

Late last year I saw some web updates from the 2013 graduates' work from my former textiles department at ANU School of Art. See here and hereAfter some time removed from the Australian textiles world, it was surprising to see how much the work tended towards fabric making, fibre art and 3D installations, as well as strong surface design. Like Kyoto Seika, ANU's interpretation of Textiles is also hard to categorize but I think it tends towards the craft and design end of the spectrum. 

投稿 by ANU Textiles Workshop.

I don't think it matters where on the spectrum or where in the imagined borders of textiles one sits. It concerns me a little that some makers, teachers, students or galleries are so determined to call themselves craft based or art based or whatever.

In rejecting the artistic possibilities of taking Kaga-yuzen outside the box of traditional Kimono or Noren formats, artisans like Teranishi-san would appear to be selfishly preventing the technique from developing into and adapting to the future. Likewise, when a Gallery starts saying that works made using a “traditional craft” technique are outside the borders of contemporary art then what happens to traditional techniques in the future? Where are they to be showcased or continued?

I think if it weren't for the borders being drawn between 'art' and 'craft' by the powers that be (such as galleries, schools, juried exhibitions, art societies) we probably wouldn't question what we make at all. Our work would be our work. We could straddle both worlds of craft and art; of traditional technique and contemporary art. Why not go ahead and incorporate design, 3D and functional elements too and pieces made merely (some might call it merely) for creative expression?

If we go ahead and slot ourselves into where our teachers and audience are saying we fit, we lose the chance to make new discoveries, to create new ideas, to be innovative. 

Bird-calls and Colours Across Cultures 鳴き声や色＋言語と文化

I've written very briefly before on how birds are given different names in Japanese and often kanji characters as well. Well, it's not just the names we give to birds that differs across languages, it's also the birds' language itself; their vocalisations. This was brought back to mind when I found a lovely picture book in the Kyoto Seika library today illustrating the different calls of Japanese birds.
海外の鳥でも漢字の名前があると前に軽く書きました。でも、言語によって変わるのは鳥名だけではなくて、鳥の鳴き声も変わりますね。当たり前なことかもしれないけれども、今間図書館で鳥の鳴き声の絵本を見つけたら、改めて面白いと思いました。

Perhaps the most well known bird call in Japan is that of the Japanese bush warbler, uguisu in Japanese. This little harbinger of spring cries 'ho-hokekkyo'. I had learnt this in a class before ever hearing the real thing and on comparing the two...well, it required some mental aerobics.
日本では一番よく知られている鳴き声はウグイスではないでしょうか？春に「ホーホケキョ」という独特な鳴き声をしますね。初めて本物を聞いた時は、「うーん、ホーホケキョのかな？」と疑問に思ったけれども！

♪♪HO-HokKEKYo!!!♪♪♪ホーホケキョ!♪

Other birdcalls in the book I was leafing through today include:
* the black Kite (tonbi)  English "shrill whistle" or "whinnying call" becomes (ready for this?!) "pi-hyororororo…"
* a Japanese robin (komadori) cries "hinkarararara"
* a Japanese Paradise flycatcher (sankoucho), get this, chirps "tsukihihoshi-hoi-hoi-hoi"!
and one last one,
* the brown-headed thrush sings "kyoron, kyoron, chiriri"

その絵本にこういう面白い鳴き声もありました:
* トンビの「ピーヒョロロロ」
* コマドリの「ヒンカラカラララ」
* サンコウチョウの (これが一番面白いかな！？) 「月日星ホイホイホイ」
*アカハラの「キョロンキョロン、チリリリ」

♪Tsukihihoshi-hoi-hoi-hoi!!!♪♪♪ツキヒホシ、ホイホイホイ♪♪

I suppose in English it's just as difficult. In bird identification books you often read equally abstract descriptions such as "a high pitched pink-pink" or "abrupt, guttural screeches".確かに英語にも鳥の鳴き声を言葉に表現するのが難しいですね。鳥類本には「低いスクリースクリー」とか、「高調子のピンッピンッ」という曖昧な説明をよく見ます。

♪♪pink-pink-pink!♪♪♪♪ピンッピンッ♪♪

Even among Australian-English speakers, there's huge variations in how someone describes the scream of a Cockatoo, for example, so it's no wonder it differs across languages and oceans. It makes sense that someone with a different linguistic background and different set of sounds in their alphabet would put a sound down in language in a different way. I wonder what birds call in something like French?!オーストラリア英語をしゃべる人の中でも、例えば、オウムの鳴き声を色んな言葉で表現します。そう考えたら、違う言語又は違う国では鳥の鳴き声を違う言葉で書くのは当たり前ですね。もちろん、音を自分が慣れている母国語で表します。フランスなどの鳥は何の鳴き声かとは気になりますね。

Japanese colours...いわえる「日本の色」

I had also been pondering this question of language in terms of colour names. I was given a book recently on "Japanese colours". The book has pages upon glossy pages of colour swatches and gives their names in Japanese (mainly in kanji) and then gives some history of why this name came into use. It's probably just because I am looking in from the outside, but these kanji names are often whimsical and beautiful. 

For example 京都紫　Kyoto Purple, 小豆色　Red-bean paste, 金茶色 golden tea/golden brown, 鶯色 Japanese warbler green... (ho-hokkekyo anyone?)

この言語の問題も「色名」にもかかわっていると思いました。
最近、「日本の色」という本を貰いました。ツルツルのページに色のサンプルがぎっしり並んでいて、漢字での名前とその色の歴史も書いてあります。
漢字は自分の文化にはないからかもしれないですが、色の漢字名がとても美しくて魅力的だと思いました。
例えば、京都紫、小豆色、金茶、鶯色 (ホーホケキョだね) など。

LtoR: Kyoto Purple, Red-bean, Golden Tea, Uguisu　左から京都紫、小豆色、金茶、鶯色 

I have some hesitations when Japanese people proudly tell me about "Japanese colours" as if they are something unique borne of Japanese culture. Colours are colours, just a result of reflected light hitting a certain wavelength. So-called Japanese colours are just those that have, for various reasons, been favoured in Japanese culture.　いわゆる「日本の色」についてちょっと疑問を持っています。日本の文化から生まれた独特なものだという自慢しているように言われると、うーん、そうなん？って思います。
色って、ただ色です。太陽による理化学的な現象だけです。その中に、何かの理由で昔から日本人にただ好まれて来たものは「日本の色」だというのではないか？

colours are just science. who's to say this isn't Uluru, Eucalyptus Green and Wattle Yellow?
色は理化学から生まれた物です。これをオーストラリア的な名前でも呼べるでしょう？
ウルル色、ユーカリ緑、アカシア黄色(オーストラリアの代表花)などは？

is it an earthen wall or ready for tea dunking?　
これは「生壁」? それとも  「クッキー」?

Given the same colour-swatch, an English painter, for example, would no doubt have his own name to describe that particular shade. In fact, this painter might even give a name for that colour that comes from such a different angle that it's laughable. How about "生壁色　freshly rendered earthen wall" being turned into something like "biscuit"?　日本の色のサンプルを見たら、例えば、イギリス人の絵師は違う名前で表現するでしょう。それに、イギリス人が使う色名は、おかしいほど全く違う歴史や意味を持つ場合が多いと思います日本の文化に根している「生壁色」は英語でBiscuit(クッキーの意味)というですし。

Despite being almost the exact same shade, see the linguistic chasms between "young bamboo green" and "parrot green" or "Japanese mugwort" and "olive" or even more simply put, "tea" and "coffee"? Isn't colour an interesting way that cultures overlap and then shear away from each other?
殆ど同じ色なのに、二つの言語で違う言葉があって、その言葉の由来は違うのは面白いと思います。「若竹色」は「インコグリーン」に近い、「よもぎ」は「オリーブ」で表現できるでしょう。代表例として、「茶色」は「コーヒー」とよく言い表します！

I sat in on a lecture last year by the widow of a famous Japanese painter who made his work using oil paints (introduced to Japan). She raised an interesting point that a pigment colour is the same, whether it is mixed with oil to make oil paint, a binder to make acrylics, powdered to form water colours or mixed with animal glue to form Japanese 'iwaenogu' pigments.
We are all making artwork with the same set of colours, just utilising them in different applications and, as you can now see, with different names.
去年、日本画の作家さんによる講演を見に行ったとき、絵の具についての面白かったことが頭に残っています。それは、油と混ぜて油絵にしても、膠と混ぜて岩絵の具にしても、バインダーと混ぜてアクリル絵の具にしても、豆汁と混ぜて染色用顔料にしても、その原料の「色」は一緒ということです。色んな国で、違う使い方で用いながら、違う名前で表現しながら、同じ色を使っています。

The names for these birds, colours and birdcalls are just differing references based on our own cultural and linguistic backgrounds. And they are all the richer for them.　鳥名、色名、鳴き声は、文化や言語に基づいて異なっているけれども、それこそ豊な世界ではないかと思っています。

Bingata vs Katazome 「紅型」対「型染」

Studying katazome, you inevitably end up hearing about and seeing the very similar technique of bingata which　developed in Okinawa.Two weeks ago, I was lucky enough to finally get to visit Okinawa and managed to check out a couple of bingata working ateliers whilst I was there. It was an interesting exercise in realising various differences between bingata and katazome. Let's explore some of those here.
型染を勉強すると、沖縄の「紅型」を必ずどこかで知るようになります。2週間前、やっと沖縄へ行けて、居るあいだに紅型の所にも足を運びました。紅型と型染の違いが多いと思って、面白い経験でした。ここでその違いや特徴をいくつか見てみましょう。

example of an 18-19thC Ryuku Bingata national heritage piece.

Katazome vs Bingata
The basics process of the two techniques are essentially the same: A stencil is carved out of heavy paper, this is used to apply a gooey resist paste onto the fabric, the paste dries and the exposed fabric is dyed, then the resist paste is removed to reveal white un-dyed areas.
「型染」対「紅型」
両方の基礎はそんなに異なっていません。つまり、分厚い紙からステンシルを彫って、柔らかな糊を置いて、乾いた糊の間を染めて、蒸してから洗うと染めていない所が見えってくるという工程のです。

hint as to why I like bingata.. birds! bingata designs often feature brightly coloured birds in flight

Some features of bingata, however, are markedly different from katazome.
しかし、紅型、あるいは「琉球紅型」には特徴も幾つかあります。

For one thing, traditional bingata is extravagantly colourful! (Bingata actually translates as "coloured patterns") Think reds, deep yellows, greens, purples and blues. I'd like to think this is due in part to Okinawa's tropical island climate and the subsequent vivid high-saturation flowers and light they have there. (it's currently a Japanese prefecture but it's quite far south from main island Japan.) But it's probably more to do with the Chinese influence on the visual language of the old Ryukyu Kingdom and the fact that pigments were often imported from China. Plant dyes made from local plants like fukugi and Okinawan indigo were used as well as pigments like yellow ochre, vermillion and indigo were used. Apparently yellow was reserved for (then named) Ryukyu Kingdom royalty.
一つ目として、すごく鮮やかのです！！(紅型の意味は鮮やかな模様ですし…)
沖縄の熱帯の気候に咲く花や強い陽射しのおかげだと考えたいけど、昔から使われていた植物染料や顔料は中国に影響を受けましたのでしょう。

various colourful bingata patterns. they are often very very detailed too!

I went all the way to Osaka in 2012 to catch an amazing exhibition of bingata.  I remember being just floored by the colours! Pinks, sky blues, purples, yellows...If the pieces on display had faded at all in their 100+ years then old Ryukyu was certainly a colourful place! 
2012年、大きいな紅型の展覧会をわざわざ大阪まで見に行きました。その時、色彩に感動しました！ピンク、水色、紫、黄色など。100年以上まえに作られたものも沢山あって、その色は昔もっと鮮やかだったはずだと思ったらすごいですね！

Another feature of bingata is the decorative patterns which often have large unconnected open areas which you don't see in old katazome. 
Let me explain with a picture of the stencils used for in both techniques. 
もう一つの特徴は、花や鳥のデザインに細かい線や型染には見ない空白が入っているのことです。説明しにくいから両方の代表的な型紙の例を見ましよう。

Fine traditional katazome stencils, carving blades and punches.

The very traditonal katazome stencils seen here (known as Ise Katagami) have been carved to cut and remove small shapes.The design on the left includes lines that touch an cross to keep the whole thing in one piece. In the centre, you see an expert carver working with a VERY fine blade to cut several layers of stencil paper at once. On the right, ridiculously tiny sharp punches, both circular and shaped were often used to create uber fine details, originally employed to give the illusion of a woven fabric. Once carved, the stencil paper is left as is and soaked before use.
伝統的な型紙、いわゆる「伊勢型紙」は上に見えるように、細かい部分を刀又は丸きりで切り抜きます。和紙でできている型紙を何枚か重ねてから彫ることが多かったそうです。彫ったあと、水でぬらして、糊を置きます。

more open Katazome stencils also existed and these often had a fine silk mesh applied to ease paste application, as you can just see in the right image.

Sometimes more open designs (though never seem to be quite as open as bingata stencils) were lacquered over and had a fine silk mesh applied so that the artisan's spatula didn't catch on the stencil during paste application.
切り抜いた所が大きい場合、ヘラが型紙に引っかからないように紗を漆で貼ります。（右上で紗が見えます）

Now let's look at some bingata stencils. さて、紅型の方は？

bingata stencils with large open areas, 'floating' elements and fine sweeping lines.

You can see these bingata stencils incorporate thin curving lines and a birds etc that are suspended in space, that is, not connected to other parts of this design physically. You can imagine how, when you cut this stencil, you would end up with a handful of sad, separated pieces, right? So to keep it all in one piece, temporary connecting lines are left between areas of the design, then after a fine layer of silk mesh has been applied with lacquer, they are are removed and the stencil is usable. This use of open space is much more marked than in katazome.
紅型の型紙では、細かい曲がっている線や繋がっていない鳥などがみえます。下にある型紙を普通に切ると、バラバラの物になるから、切るときにつながる「橋」を残して、絹の紗を張ってから橋を除くと使えるようになります。

can you see the gradations on the petals and feather details?

You might notice the gradations of colour in this bingata example. This characteristic effect is acheived using a combination of dyes (which enter the fabric and grip fibres) and pigments (which rest on the surface of the fabric). When we visited Shiroma Bingata, we watched the workers first apply a layer of flat pigment colour which has been mixed to a liquid with soymilk. Next, they were using a very stiff bristled round brush, to almost dry brush a darker shade or different dye colour over the top in certain areas to create accent areas and to really push the pigment into the fabric.

this is how the gradations are done. a quick sweep of darker dye with a brush then smudging it hard into the fabric with a stiff bristled brush.

上の例には暈しのところに気付きました？これは、繊維を掴む「染料」と生地の上に塗る「顔料」を両方使うことによるできた効果です。城間紅型工房へ邪魔したとき、色差しのところも見えました。そこで、まず豆汁に溶けた顔料を塗っていました。次は、色がしっかり生地に入るように、硬くて小さい刷毛で染料を所々に暈して染めていました。より濃い色の染料など別の色で暈しを染めるから、印象的ですね。

The feature of bingata that I am most in awe of and often confounded by is the use of "fuse-nori", that is, a second process of very carefully covering previously dyed areas with another layer of resist paste and once dry, dyeing the background colour. The bingata patterns are often so fine and detailed and whilst the entire pattern may not be covered with fuse nori (allowing layering of colours) the time and patience involved in covering over all those tiny design parts gets some serious respect from me. 紅型の行程で一番尊敬しているのが「伏せ糊」の作業です。「伏せ糊」というのは、背景の地色が染めれるために、一回染めた模様（又はその一部）をまた糊でかぶせていくの仕事です。ものすごい細かい仕事で、時間がかなりかかりそうです。でも、この段階があるため、また別の雰囲気が出せます。

See these examples of fuse nori and what it allows you to achieve. The white areas have been preserved with the second layer of paste. 伏せ糊を使えば、こういう感じで染められます。

bingata patterns where a second layer of masking paste has allowed a background colour to be dyed too

I think I might put together a second post about our visit to Shiroma Bingata studio but suffice to say I was impressed with the different distinctive characteristics of bingata. I'm thinking it would be exciting to combine some bingata tricks and qualities with katazome or even with yuzen! Always inspiring to find new possibilities like this.　また城間紅型工房の見学について書こうと思っていますが、一応「紅型の特徴に感動しました！！」と言いたいです。紅型の独特な行程や雰囲気を型染、もしくは友禅（！？）と組み合わせしてみたいと思ってきました！新しい可能を見つけるのは楽しいですね。