Released in 2007, Shonen Young was the first release from Denki Groove since 1999.

Thanks to Kurisu.

Meet Vanilla, a dancer who has gained quite a following in Kansai for her spectacular and complex 7-meter (23-foot) pole techniques.

Via Japan Sugoi

The other day we got email from renowned Dutch journalist, photographer, and producer Kjeld Duits letting us know that he is a regular reader of JAPUNDIT. He also took the opportunity to alert us to a new blog he has started that is dedicated to old photographs of Japan.

Old Photos of Japan is dedicated to photographs from Mr. Duits’ private collection of thousands of rare photographs, postcards, and maps of Japan. It is a multilingual photoblog with daily uploads of rare photographs and postcards of Japan between 1860 and the 1930’s.

What makes Old Photos of Japan especially interesting for Japundit readers are the Google Maps. They make it possible to find the exact location displayed in the image. Lots of fun if you know Japan well. Often, the entries also feature historical maps showing where the photographer stood some 100 years ago to make the shot.

These images display an abundance of information about the urban settings and customs of Japan. Well-researched articles accompany the images. Many of the articles contain maps and additional illustrations, making them a fun and useful resource on Meiji, Taisho and early Showa Japan.

The photographs can be searched by keyword, period, theme, location, photographer and medium.

The site cubo.cc has only one page. It features a Japanese woman following your mouse pointer with her eyes. While I’m sure this will bring out the peeping Tom in some of you, I couldn’t help not to notice how red her eyes are.

The site itself doesn’t offer any further information other than an e-mail address and a link to another site. However, inspecting the source code, the technology seems to originate from motionportrait.com.

Seen on Mixx.

I told you about the rare Unkei statue of Dainichi Nyorai up for sale at Christie’s in New York. By good fortune, I was invited to a lecture and reception where I learned a great deal about the statue’s history and met a number of lovely (and often eccentric) people.

The statue was a dream. At one point, I was alone in the gallery with two art historian friends and we were able to look through the Buddha’s ears–you can see in one ear and out the other. Then we crouched down to look up into his eyes as he would have been seen in a temple. Unkei pioneered a technique in which he used crystal backed with paper or cloth for eyes. The effect is uncanny. He’s known for his realistic sculptural style, and indeed the arms were dynamic, the clothing natural and the hair taut. I found the interior of the sculpture even more interesting. Xrays show that the sculpture has a gachiren inside–a paddle shaped deal that is supposed to look like a lotus. This was probably signed by the artist, given a date of dedication and signed by the donor. Attached to the gachiren were numerous relics; Unkei was a devout Buddhist who took to heart the fact that so many temples needed to be reconstituted after they’d been burned during the seige of Nara, which you can read about in the Tale of Heike.

I was back at Christie’s today when the Buddha sold for a record shattering 12.8 million dollars. This was the most that any single piece of Asian art had ever gone. The buyer? Mitsukoshi. Which means that statue is going back home to Japan where it belongs. Crisis averted.

It was a pleasure to see it so close, even if we were surrounded by upper East Side groupies wearing vintage Mandarin gear and oversized jade pendants. The people watching was almost as exciting as the Buddha watching.

Another member of the Pretty Boy Factory has Matsuoka Matsushiro, the drummer for TOKIO was spotted leaving his apartment with a girl said to resemble talento Nakagawa Shoko. The drummer confirmed that the relationship had been in existence for five years. Draconian Johnny’s Jimusho issued this statement implying that they had nothing particular to say . . . but that they “have not heard anything about a possible marriage.”

I wonder how those of you who have been in Japan a while read that statement. Johnny’s has “nothing” to say on the one hand, but does say that it hasn’t heard about a “possible marriage.” Nice way of getting the word “marriage” out there into the news. Think the couple got the point? Did you?

Friday, March 7th, Ellis Avery read an excerpt from her lovely novel, The Teahouse Fire, at Asia Society.

We then had a good discussion about her work and her work habits and this was in turn followed by a tea ceremony performed by Noriko-san of Cha’an.

Two lucky winners from the audience were selected to drink the tea. Despite the poor weather, we had a very nice turnout to enjoy the gorgeous space on the 8th floor of the Asia Society.

I asked Ellis how she had managed to capture Japan in such a 3-dimensional way, and I found her answer really compelling. Essentially, she told me that she had learned Japan “through her body.” She talked about the mosquitoes in the summer, about the long walk to the bathroom, the discomfort with sitting on the floor, the process of learning just the correct way to place and hold everything in the tea ceremony. All this had given her a visceral and physical sensation of the culture.

It seems like such an obvious answer–but I’ve actually never heard anyone say this. Most writers when speaking of craft emphasize the process as it happens in the mind. You must research a place, you must visualize characters, you may draw out a dramatic arc within your story. But of course it makes sense that the body is another instrument you can use for anything you create. The stereotype of the writer is a of a person sitting in a corner, observing. It’s helpful to feel too if you want to impart an impression of a place. Ellis has a background in the performing arts (check out her posture) and perhaps this came into play in her work.

At any rate, I had a lovely time that evening and was reminded again of just how much I enjoyed The Teahouse Fire. I hope you check out her book, if you have not already.

Art history buffs know that there is no Japanese sculptor more celebrated than Unkei. He’s even called the “Michaelangelo of Japan” due to the sheer virtuosity of his work, and the realistic and emotional power he gave each of his pieces. Active in the late 12th and early 13th centuries, Unkei is perhaps best known to tourists for the mammoth “Ah” and “Un” statues guarding Todaiji.

It came to my attention recently that a previously unknown Unkei statue of Dainichi Nyroai is for sale at Christies, the venerable auction house, which is just about to enter Asia Week, a yearly gathering of dealers and collectors interested in Far Eastern antiquities. There hasn’t been much coverage of the Unkei piece, though it is expected to fetch an unprecedented high sum. Japanese press has covered the statue a little, mostly to say that officials fear that valuable work of art “will leave Japan(I assume this means the newly rich Chinese will get possession of it).

I’ve somehow ended up invited to a private viewing and lecture series on this sculpture and cannot wait to go. Once upon a time I did take graduate courses in art history and I hope my rusty brain will be ready to handle the information. If you are in New York, please do check out Asia Week, and perhaps find some time to visit Christies to see this rare work of art.

Ayumi: You know your career has taken off when a smitten fan paints your visage on the back of a love van. . .

. . .and you know your career is over when your portrait is spotted being unceremoniously carted off to the scrapyard.

Not to be confused with the summer lantern festival, the Toro Roman (灯籠浪漫) festival is a welcome burst of colour and winter warmth in the old town of Yamaga, Kumamoto prefecture.

You can read an excellent write-up of both summer and winter festivals here (and the same page in Japanese here). I’m just here to show you pretty pictures!

More of the same after the jump!

Not all that safe for work. Click here to see it.

A little something to relax by this weekend. . .

For those interested in finding the real Japan of old here is a site dedicated entirely promoting. . .

a wider understanding and appreciation of The Tale of Genji - the 11th Century Japanese classic written by a Heian court lady known as Murasaki Shikibu. It also serves as a kind of travel guide to the world of Genji.

Speaking of snow in Tokyo, the other day the trucked in some serious piles of the white stuff where some folks crafted them into snowmen that are real works of art.

Mr. Pink was there with his camera and he kindly shares with us what he saw. . .

Japanese producer and muscian Cornelius has been named one of the 5 Asian Acts to Watch in 2008.

“Ideas come out just through living life,” says Keigo Oyamada, 39, who goes by the stage name Cornelius, after a character in the movie Planet of the Apes. Indeed, the Tokyo-born producer and musician manages to squeeze inspiration from even the most mundane corners of existence — the song Toner on his Sensuous album, for instance, is built around noise recorded from his inkjet printer, and it’s exactly this kind of aural experimentalism that has made Oyamada a hot name among fans of electronica, and prompted bands like Bloc Party and the Go! Team to ask him to remix their songs in his explosive, multilayered and brilliantly eclectic style.

Remember those dudes who did the ping pong routine on the Kaso Taisho a while back?

Well, JAPUNDIT reader PapiGiulio writes in to let us know that they are very much back with a routine that is even more amazing. Check this one out, and be sure to watch all the way to the end. . . Absolutely amazing!

Be sure to check out PapiGiulio’s website here.

I don’t know what is grosser. . . The medium or the message. . .

Via Hello Kitty Hell

The world’s first cell phone camera film festival is currently being held in Yokohama.

The Pocket Films Festival features submissions by people who recorded films on ther camera-equipped cellphones.

The works, streaming on monitors of cell phones strapped to tables, are filled with everyday shots, some literally taken on the run with streets and cars whizzing past in a blur.

They have a voyeuristic feel because the cell phone is so unobtrusive. Devoid of the typical grandeur of standard films, they offer grainy but patiently taken close-ups that don’t rely on zooms and other fancy editing techniques.

The Pocket Films Festival in Japan, which organizers say is the first in this nation, marks yet another use for the omnipresent portable phone here, already used to exchange e-mail, surf the Internet, read novels and navigate on miniature digital maps.

Source

You may recall the video Japanese Tradition - Sushi that took the internet by storm last year.

The ‘Japan Culture Lab’ hasn’t rested on its laurels. In their own inimitable style, here is an ‘explanation’ of Origami.

Kuchisake onna. . . Yikes!

Tubbypaws