Category: Japan
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Sublime simplicity
Sublime simplicity The house: a floor with tatamis, sliding walls, a roof. Height of Japanese architecture. Walls slide open. The spectacle begins. Photo of the week: Katsura Villa, Kyoto, Japan 2008
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Zen sense
Small space turned big. It is primarily a matter of the mind. Japanese Zen masters are masters of small space. Look at this little enclosed garden: a prominent rock, a stone water basin, a raked gravel surface, a few bushes and small trees, a stone lantern … cut across by an elevated passage. Each object…
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Natura Artis Magistra
With this title I am not aiming at the Zoo in Amsterdam, but at the meaning of the words: nature is the teacher of art. Nature as source of inspiration for the arts. I took the photo just outside the wall of Chisaku-in, a temple in Kyoto. It looks like a nice piece of untouched…
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Living doll
Apart from the phallus shrine that I showed you in last week’s post, I also came across – at the same flea market – this exquisite Geisha doll. The doll almost seems alive, radiating the modesty of a real Geisha. A masterly example of true Japanese craftsmanship! Photo of the week: Geisha doll at the…
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Phallus shrine
A wooden phallus in a small wooden shrine. How did this piece end up at the flea market of Kitano-Tenman-gu? Has it figured on someone’s house altar – or bedside table – and fallen out of favour? We can only fantasize about it and think up vivid stories, but we don’t know. It is likely…
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Kinkaku-ji
Again three, and well placed, like in last weeks picture! In an earlier post with the title What shall I wear today? I have speculated on the question of ‘intention or coincidence’ in relation to a photo taken – as it happens – in the same Kinkaku-ji park. In the former case I didn’t rule…
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Two or three
Sometimes I can be perfectly happy with two, at other times it has to be three. So it seems. If it had been two I would not have annoyed you with this picture, would not have taken it in the first place. Three makes all the difference here. See how beautifully they occupy the space!…
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A roof of dense foliage
Without the supporting poles this living monument would soon collapse under its own weight. A tree with crutches, not to walk with but to remain standing. Excrescence or labour of love – impressive it is. Photo of the week: Nagamachi samurai district, Kanazawa, Japan 2008
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Blue Planet Sky
So this is what the girl in last week’s post saw through her camera, or rather it’s what I saw through my camera. Looking at the sky can be a nice activity, especially when there is some movement of clouds. Looking at the sky through a fixed frame is even more interesting. It makes you…
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Two-way masks
And what does the girl with the camera see up there? The answer to that has to wait till next week’s post. Here I’m interested in the girl with the mask, sitting in this spotlessly clean environment. I always thought that these worker’s masks were meant to protect oneself against fine dust and other unhealthy particles that can…
καιρός remembered 