Hiroshi and I went for a dive at Sunabe seawall today to spread some Christmas joy to all the underwater creatures that might otherwise miss out. Not many people know this but SCUBA is actually an acronym from Santa Cavorts Underwater By Aqualung Merry Christmas
Bokunen was born on the small Okinawan island of Izena in 1953. As a child, he always carried a sketchbook, and drew pictures of the island’s creatures and landscapes. At that time, he never imagined a career as an artist, and thought he would become either a fisherman or a carpenter. His talent, however, did not go unnoticed. One of his teachers recommended that he attend an art-based high school on the main island of Okinawa. After graduation, Bokunen became a graphic designer and set up his own design production company, Project Core. It is his skills as a woodblock artist that have gained him them most recognition. His colorful, dream-like prints were used for the Kyoto Climate Conference in 1997, the G8 Summit in 2000, and in numerous exhibitions across Japan. What process do you go through to create the prints? “I begin with a vague idea of what the image will be like, but as soon as I start to carve the wood, things change. The whole process is very fluid, almost like …
A Japanese motoring website just reviewed the much anticipated Nissan GTR specV sports car. The V-spec is the faster, lighter version of what was already one of the fastest sports cars on the planet. The video however is a great example of the paradox for sports cars in Japan: fast cars, slow roads. Speed limits in Japan are surprisingly low. In cities the maximum is usually 40 or 50 kilometers an hour. Toll-road expressways have speed limits of 100 kph ( and in Okinawa only 80 kph). In rural areas of Japan the low speed limits continue. Unlike Britain where country roads often have 60 mile per hour limits, many deserted rural roads are still restricted to 40 kilometers an hour. Unless you live close to a track the Nissan GTR specV is simply all dressed up with nowhere to go. The motoring journalist in the video however happily hurtles along past signs and road markings for 50 kilometers an hour. This disregard for the speed limit isn’t unusual, it’s epidemic. If you simply drive with …
This news is a little outdated but from the 22nd to the 28th of October Burger Kings in Japan were selling Windows 7 Whopper burgers to celebrate the arrival of Microsoft’s Windows 7 operating system. What amazes me is that someone at a PR firm thought this was a good idea, and even more remarkably, people at Microsoft agreed. Companies pay millions to be associated with certain sports stars or actors, why would Microsoft want to link itself to something quite so noxious. The campaign could almost have had the tagline “Want system failure and fatal errors, try Windows 7”.
Fantastic installation by Tokujin Yoshioka at the Hermès store in Ginza.
I just got a copy of an English language textbook that will be used at elementary schools in Korea. Lesson 4 is Why Do Snow Monkeys Hug? and includes my Monkey Hug photograph. So today’s question is… “Who do you like to hug?”
In the December issue of Okinawa Living magazine there’s an interview I did with ceramic artist Nick Centala. I’ve added the extended text and a few images below for people who can’t get hold of the magazine. Potter with a Magic Touch Okinawa’s most valuable asset is its people. This month we meet Nick Centala, a ceramic artist using traditional firing techniques to produce modern designs. Nick Centala was born in Los Angeles. At 18 he joined the U.S. Navy as a corpsman and over the next 4 years he was based in San Diego and Okinawa. After the military, Nick studied pre-med to become a doctor, but a return visit to Okinawa steered his life down a different path. In 2001, he spent five weeks learning about sculpting shîsâ with Okinawan potter Miyagi Shojin. A consuming passion for pottery grew from this experience. He switched his life goals from medicine to art, and became an apprentice to a potter in Kumamoto. After 3 months, he was offered a job managing a large wood-burning oven …
Now that nearly all computer related issues have been resolved, I’m able to do a bit of scanning and put up a few blog posts. Here’s the latest “The Traveling Photographer” from the December issue of Okinawa Living Magazine. This month it’s all about using natural framing. See a larger, readable, scan of the page here.
Here’s the second image from the model shoot of Nikki I did with Eboh last month.
I watched the Ryukyu Kings vs. Osaka Evessa basketball game today. This is the first basketball game I’ve ever seen in Japan, and only the second in my life. (I saw the Harlem Globetrotters play in Calgary, Canada.) It was a great afternoon’s entertainment. Okinawa beat Osaka 82 to 77, which pleased the spectators. Of the 2815 in attendance, I think at least 2800 were Kings supporters. I took my little point and shoot camera with me. The quality of the image isn’t that great, but of the few shots I took one of them was of a Kings player dunking the ball.
