Ode to the Spring Lost

Sometimes words don´t come easily. Behind me is a very strange month, with lots of ups and downs. We lost April and hanami to the coronavirus pandemic and rain so I decided to do two new “flower powered” paintings. Actually I wanted to do 4 but the half of the month was rainy and I don´t like to drive my bike in the rain to atelier and to tell you the truth I don´t like getting out of the bed on a rainy day 🙂

I hope every one of you had at least one chance to observe sakura or any other blossom last month, just a few minutes of admiring, a short break on your way to your job or store. We had another sad event this spring- magnolia flowers that bud earlier got frozen in a sudden drop of temperature, so they didn´t fully bloom.

Spring Paintings

I did two “spring pictures” but not explicit shunga lyrics, rather beautiful pictures with a touch of eroticism.

The first one is (I Think Her Name’s) Debra that I painted after a print Motozue of the Daimonjiya, from the series Contest of Beauties of the Pleasure Quarters (Kakuchû bijin kurabe) by Chokosai Eisho, a bijin-ga that represents a spring spirit.

The second one, Creation of Adam (Roses), is about love like in Dean Martin´s songs, for the spring is awaking of love.

Extinction, Apocalypse and other big words

This month was all apocalyptical and everyone is going on about extinction, mind control over 5G, Bill Gates´s vaccines putting microchips into people…  it would be hilarious if it wasn´t scary how much spotlight dumb people get on the internet and media. I think that this is the greatest disadvantage of internet and global village that it is not connecting and enforcing intelligent people but rather it became breeding ground for stupidity.

So about the Extinction I recommend reading a book by Elizabeth Kolbert, The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History that will hopefully help you understand the meaning and the process of extinction, and how big individual effect you can have on it but at the same time stay absolutely unimportant.

About coming of the Apocalypse I recommend listening Johnny´s rant in the movie by Mike Leigh, Naked (1993). I adore this movie and I think it is Leigh´s best work. Johnny was played by David Thewlis and I just love seeing him in other movies (including Harry Potter) because of the Naked. Naked came out during the Bosnian War and I had this pirated WHS tape (alongside Eraserhead by Lynch and Tetsuo: The Iron Man by Shinya Tsukamoto) that I would play almost every day. At the time (like 10 years) everything seemed pointless and it took me a while to get Johnny´s cynicism out of the system (but not entirely). If you can, watch the movie and if you are interested only in his rant, play the Orb´s track S.A.L.T. from album Orblivion, nice ambient electronica filled with paranoia.

Instagram

I was asked by a few friends to make Instagram account so they can follow my work more easily and here it is https://www.instagram.com/muhamedkafedzic/ you won. Don´t know what to say about that, I guess you need to feed the feed. I hope some of you will still like to read what´s behind the pictures and visit my website.

I need help on identifying one diorama

I spent the whole week trying to identify a diorama that I saw on tatebanko.com. I tried contacting the owner of the website with no success. On diorama I can identify Benkei and I assume it is duel scene with Ushiwakamaru at Gojo Bridge. I went through 30 000 prints and over 1500 玩具絵 (omocha-e) and the closest print to this scene that I could find is one in Ukiyo-e database of The Digital Humanities Center for Japanese Arts and Cultures (DH-JAC) at Ritsumeikan University.

Diorama in question belongs to the collection of Kouzo Hida (肥田晧三) who studied and colected omocha-e. If you know someone who shares the interest, please ask them if they recognize this diorama set.

To take a break from all the work I played a video game Lord of Apocalypse (ロード・オブ・アポカリプス), that I can recomend only to the fans of Monster Hunter, Soul Sacrifice and Phatasy Star Universe games, because the story in the game is absolutely mindless, but the game play is quick, relaxing and satisfying.

Spring recommendation

If you are locked in your home and you only have your TV in front of you I recommend watching Normal People TV series, which will remind you of your first love and maybe spark spring hormones in you. Also you could read a book by the same name by Sally Rooney. If you are not already watching My Brilliant Friend TV series, I highly recommend that too.

For Japanese speaking friends

If you have a few more minutes, please, read an article about my friend Kohei Agano and his family´s long tradition of inlay pottery.

https://kumamototeshigoto-labo.jp/feature.php?id=46

That is it for now!

I am off to make two new diorama paintings.

Live long and have
Peace, Love, Udon & Sake

muha