lessons with kate - miho kajioka

the brutal truth

I detest discrimination in all its many hydra-headed forms. I believe in celebrating difference, not using it as a weapon to divide.

Whilst explicit sexism has become just a little less common these days the more insidious danger lies in the implicit. Click on this link to find out more about discrimination in photography - it remains the brutal truth.

this week's photographer

Week 2 and Kate Green introduces us to the work of Miho Kajioka,  a very talented young Japanese photographer now living in San Fransisco. Her work is ethereal, calming and fragile. She uses empty space in and around an object to define it.

Miho's photographs have a timeless quality to them, enhanced by the thoughtful use of black and white tones or muted colours.

Not only are the images beautiful, the way they are presented brings a painterly quality to them too. Milo places her subjects in long or wide frames to emphasise the negative space to be found within. She applies origami folds, she uses silver-tone and she stains her pictures with tea. 

Her images transcend photography and enter a place where everything is art and art is everything.

the challenge

This week's challenge is to produce two images applying what we've learned about Miho's work. The theme is 'connect to your inner child'. 

Here's what I came up with.

what did I do?

The technical bits first. I used a Fuji medium-format camera for its super resolution and image quality. The ISO setting was high and the aperture wide - I was shooting in virtual darkness.

After taking each shot I reviewed the image on the camera's back-screen and used both exposure compensation and film effect to create different images.

Back home I tweaked highlights and shadows, cropped the pictures slightly and applied a vignette and a silver-tone to create a dream-like quality to the images.

Creatively, my focus on connecting to the inner child centred on the mystery and magic of seeing the world in the dark.

As a very small child I remember my parents bundling me and my younger brother into the back seat of the car and driving in the dark in the vain hope he would cease his incessant bawling. I marvelled as the headlights lit up a world which looked so very different in the day.

The choice of a tree to photograph was deliberate. It reminded me of when I was four or five with a hunger to read everything I could lay my hands on. I found Enid Blyton's 'Faraway Tree' stories on our local library and they became a safe sanctuary of my own where I could visit and dream.

what did I learn?

The act of stopping after each shot to check the results on the camera screen made me slow down. It created a natural, gentle-paced rhythm which enabled to think (whether consciously or unconsciously) on a much deeper level.

I'm also intrigued by the way Miho presents her images. In the next few weeks I hope to investigate how I may shape my images using physical means rather than software.

 

the last monk

 

The komusō (虚無僧, komusō, hiragana: こむそう; also romanized komusou or komuso) were a group of Japanese mendicant monks  of the Fuke school of Zen Buddhism who flourished during the Edo period of 1600–1868. 

The order went underground following reforms introduced by the post-Edo government. The last adherent disappeared mysteriously in the 1950s, since when nothing has been heard of the order.

 

Komusō were characterized by a straw bascinet (a sedge or reed hood named a tengai) worn on the head, manifesting the absence of specific ego but also used for being able to travel incognito.

 

It was very rare to catch sight of a Komusō with his mask removed.

 

 

 

the plot thickens

Dear Sheddists,

in the third session of our Creative Writing course we're invited to extend the characters we've created into a short third party narrative.

So here's where I took Mimi, the fading Japanese beauty created by my group in our last session ...

'She smiles, not from her eyes but from her mouth. The camera tracks down down the languid curves that now fill out her form until it reaches her hands, clasped loosely but elegantly in her lap.

The interviewer leans forward. An intimacy that invades the jasmine-scented bubble inhabited by Mimi.  She smiles again and her eyes are deep black pools into which the interviewer finds himself drawn inexorably. He is violating her space.

There is an uneasy tension in the studio as the camera pans upward to Mimi's face, still smiling, still inviting his question.

She moves her head casually to one side, coquettishly guiding the hooked interviewer toward her unrelenting gaze. And in homes the length and breadth of the country TVs are pimped to the max with the garish, psychedelic mess of the interviewer's tie now strangling his scrawny, salary-man's neck. Adolescent boys coalesce in thick clumps around the screens. Waiting. Expectant.

Mimi looks up into the approaching face of her adversary and her eyes widen, taking the first bloodied bite. The studio falls silent but for the barely perceptible flutter of two pairs of immaculately trained eye-lashes. They are locked onto their prey.

His head has gone now. Eaten by the eyes as she continues to devour the interviewer's body piece by piece, closing round his neck as she sucks him in with a sickening sllllluuurrrrrpppppp.  One last gulp and he's gone as the swarming boys erupt in feverish ecstacy.

Chiharu strokes her slumbering form gently.

'Mimi, Mimi ... come to me, Mimi'.

She holds her close. Mimi is drenched and shivering as she comes round.

'You've had that dream again ...'

Chiharu rubs her trembling shoulders, easing the last of the night horrors from the exhausted and satiated body of her lover.'

And if you want to catch up with the back-story just scroll down to earlier entries on my blog.

Yours as ever,

electrofried(mr)

characters

Dear Sheddists,

during my second writing class we looked at the creation of characters.

Toward the end we collaborated in small groups to develop our own character and this is what the group I was in came up with ...

 Mimi -  a study in fading elegance

'Mimi is a Japanese lady in her fifties.  She was once 'something' in the media and has a loyal following of teenage boys who idolise and idealise her.  Her external beauty is slowly dissolving.

Mimi  is fighting against the media's view of her. This conflict is reflected in the nervous twitching of her left foot, exacerbated by the early onset of arthritis.  She has a dark secret - a relationship with an older woman. Through this she seeks to overcome poor bonding with her own mother who died in a tragic accident while Mimi was still young.

Mimi toys constantly with a small jade netsuke. This object has a permanence and a solidity which contrasts starkly with her fading elegance and the temporary nature of the world she inhabits.

Mimi wears an expensive haute couture trouser-suit coupled with a high-necked silk blouse.  Her outfit is complemented by beautiful jewelry.  Mimi's make-up is immaculate and tasteful - she has red nails.

Her demeanor is serene. Mimi is well-used to the attentions of the camera.  However, from time to time she will glance over her shoulder. Perhaps she's concerned her past is catching up with her.'

A second character

We also devised a second character to interact with Mimi ... 

'Mimi has an octogenarian fan who is both wealthy and utterly obsessed. He has statues at the gated entrance to his large estate in the shape of Mimi's netsuke.

This man has suffered many failed relationships in the past.  No one he has met can ever match his idol.

His wealth comes from the pharmaceutical company he has built up over the years.

The man is average-looking, nothing to mark him out from the crowd. He does, however, have a Mimi tattoo on a hidden part of his body.'

A diary entry for Mimi

Our homework this week is to compose a diary entry written by our chosen character. Here's my attempt ...

'Flowers today - lots of them. Just like yesterday, just like the day before that, just like for ever. What on earth am I going to do with them all?!  Chiharu can't stand them. Says they remind her of the cherry-blossom gardens in the Hirano Shrine at Kyoto.   

I'm getting worried about Chiharu. She's starting to drift. Takes her ages to get going in the morning. She talks endlessly about mist, dewdrops, shrouds and different shades of moss and none of it makes the remotest bit of sense.

I have to pull myself together. An interview this morning.  I'll wear the navy trouser-suit. Seems more ... commanding.  And I need to be on top of my game today.

Let's throw away all the flowers. Got to make sure the wrapping paper is folded neatly. I'll put the cellophane and those funny little green bags of crystals to one side to make sure they all go in the right recycling bin.  And what exactly should I do with the crystals?  I can't make up my mind which bin to put them in. Perhaps I should just grind them up and feed them to Chiharu with her breakfast jasmine tea! She'll never notice. She might even enjoy them.

A shower, make-up, nails - it seems to take longer and longer with each passing day.  Just hope I can get through that interview OK.'

Well it's hardly a work of art, but I enjoyed the challenge of trying to bring a character to life in a few short sentences.  I'm looking forward to what next week brings!

Yours as ever,

electrofried(mr)

Quilt Show - Part 1

a wedding

We speed down the motorway in convoy, dodging the rain clouds.

The grounds of the Abbey are green and lush, welcoming like the party within.  They come from around the world to witness a young Englishman and young Japanese lady exchange their vows.  And the language of love is universal - no words are needed.

These photographs are dedicated to my nephew, his beautiful new bride and their respective families ...



私たちは、雨雲を逃れ、船団を組んで高速道路をスピードを落とす。

修道院の敷地内には内のパーティのように歓迎し、緑と緑豊かです。彼らは若いイギリスと日本の若い女性の交換、その誓いを目撃するために、世界中から来る。と愛の言語は普遍的である - 何の言葉は必要ありません。

これらの写真は私の甥、彼の美しく新しい花嫁と、それぞれの家族に捧げている...