Oh Tokyo

My last night in Tokyo, I had dinner at Shabu-zen, unknowingly sat in Scarlett's Lost in Translation scene spot. We had premium Japanese beef (paper thin and very marbled) with winter vegetables in the middle of summer. As of last night, I had spent eight weeks in Japan. Enough time to eat, look at art, make art, and meet the right people. Happy and challenged to make something of the whole trip. I can be a Japan-guide now.

Food highights off the top of my head:
1. Jangara Ramen
2. Shin sushi
3. Maisen tonkatsu
4. Champion-Ebisu steak
5. Kyubei sushi
6. Morimoto XEX


Art space highlights:
1. Hara Museum of Contemporary Art
2. Gallery Ef
3. Gallery Koyanagi
4. Mori Art Museum
5. SCAI the Bathhouse
6. 21_21 Design Site

Really fun things to do:
1. watch the fish at the Sony Aquarium, Ginza
2. watch the shadows lengthen and the sky change colors at sunset from the Wald 9th floor cinema theaters, Shinjuku
3. sit in Starbucks at Tsutuya and watch the people crossing, Shibuya
4. wander around Tokyu Hands / Itoya / Muji / Loft / any 100 yen store / Bic Camera
5. watch the elevator girls in Matsuya / Mizukoshi
6. walk around the Meiji shrine, Harajuku
7. take the skybus tour of the Imperial Palace walls and Marunuochi, Tokyo station
8. read the design and art magazines at the National Art Center library on the 3rd floor, Roponggi
9. watch the dogs prancing outside the groomers in Tokyo Midtown, Roponggi
10. walk around Ginza on Saturday and Sunday afternoons when they close the streets to cars, and the old people set up pretty umbrellas
11. go to a Pecha Kucha night in superdeluxe, Roponggi
12. walk around Comme des Garcons and Prada in Omotesando

Best Bookstores:
1. Nadiff in Ebisu
2. Watari Museum basement bookstore - the most beautiful bookstore I have ever seen, and they have English language books
3. Tower records 7th floor in Shibuya

Books you NEED to have to survive:
1. Tokyo Metropolitan Atlas - the best 2,000 yen you will spend in Japan
2. Claska Guide
3. Art Beat Tokyo
4. Michelin food guide - Tokyo has the most number of star restaurants, second only to the whole of France

Things people told me to do that I did that were not a big deal:
1. watch cosplay (costume play) dresser uppers in Harajuku and Yoyogi on Sundays (the gothic bo-peeps and elvises and ... )
2. walk down Takeshita street in Harajuku

On the whole, Tokyo was a challenge and an experience. Staying in an office building felt like I was being detained and living in a horror movie (the picture is the view from my window, isn't all that concrete charming?; the horror movie was 'The Ring'). But can't complain, it was clean and very well located in the heart of Aoyama. But the language barrier and cultural differences were the bigger challenges, add to their written language not being in our alphabet really can get you lost. But was glad for it all. The alone time pushed me to do many things I would otherwise not do. Plus I lost weight from all the summer walking. Best part was rediscovering the playing in photography.

The show will happen soon. Thanks for reading. The adventures continue.

Darkroom Realization

Spent today in a darkroom in Shinjuku. Thought that seven hours was a really long time to have a reservation, but turned out I wanted to be in there longer. I felt sorry though for the guy who was my neighbor in the lab. I kept hitting his wall--and that vibration moves the enlarger which blurs his prints! Sorry!

The wall was so close to the blind turn door, it was impossible to move through the curtains with my prints without either my body or my elbow hitting the wall. What got me thinking was guy who was my neighbor passed the same door a lot, and never hit the wall, ever.

Am I really just heavy handed and clumsy?

Beautiful Leica

Shibuya crossing is five minutes from where I am staying. It's a crazy place, thousands of people crossing the four way stop every 3.5 minutes.

Glad to be back. Now the real work starts. Of processing, editing, editing some more, and then editing again. At the end of which, do I make prints, or do just guerilla slideshow? Shot a bunch of polaroids and color negatives. Am very happy with how they came out. The polaroids were actually Fuji wide angle Instax, it was incredible fun. The colors are so saturated that they can only be unreal.

And the color negatives... sigh. I AM IN LOVE with my Leica. From the first time I shot it many years ago, to today, I've not experienced the same happiness with my pictures from any other camera. I always think I am not shooting right, wanting to pull back or move closer, or change the setting. Plus, the silent click of the shutter is so unassuming and the old boxy body is so low key that I've had bigger SLR boys look down on my single fixed lens on a film camera.

But when the negatives come out, makes me Happy. Something about film, the photograph is something you can walk into, it has a 3D quality to it. With digital photographs, the photograph is sitting on the paper, it is not in the paper. I can't really explain it, but you know what I mean. Anyway, the Leica M6 that I am proud to carry is an awesome machine. Photo in this post and the one after done by it. I have had people stop me in the street here and say "beautiful camera Reica".

Super Sink

Have not minded the complicated toilets too much as they are ubiquitous here.

But certainly, it is a challenge to figure out how to work the majority of these toilets as there are countless models. The most complicated one had 8 settings on each mode for water temperature and jet strength for bidet / spray / blow.... You can even choose the temperature of the toilet seat, and of course there is running water as soon as you sit (to "provide melodious sound while not embarass" was the written explanation).

But then, I saw this


A sink that's fully motion sensored for soap (L spout), water (R spout), and warm air (basin). Wow! It can actually serve as hair dryer as the blast of hot air ricochets off the basin and hits you hard and fast on the forehead.

Pine Tree, Joinery, and Carp

Kenrokuen Garden, Karasakinomatsu Pine

This garden was magnificent. Centuries old trees all grand and manicured. The control and discipline of the Japanese way spreads wide over everything, including the growth of nature, which is both controlled and dolled up. The irrigatiion system in this garden is several centuries old! The like pines and rocks in their garden. Pine trees are evergreens, signifying longevity. Rocks and stones signify loyalty.

Kanazawa Castle

Fully restored according to ancient Japanese joinery practices. Not a single nail was used in the process.

Carp Everywhere

Samurai and Spelling

Walked all over Kanazawa. I was not boycotting taxis nor buses, but I couldn't find a taxi, and I couldn't understand the bus map. So I walked and walked and walked. And chanced upon a district of Samurai houses. The streets were stone, the walls low, with moss gardens and open shoji screens; and oh so quiet. It was the time of day that allowed for the sun to shine strong and low on the horizon. It was beautiful.

Kanazawa is an old town, think early 14th c. with a castle and a garden. I mean an entire town within a castle and garden. I understand now why the Tokyo people really wanted me to see this.

They also have an ultra modern contemporary art museum right beside the garden called Kanazawa21. It has Anish Kapoor, Mona Hatoum, James Turrell, and a set of A-listers in the contemporary art world in their permanent collection. I took many many photos but these two are the ones that stayed with me. Note how many other names are written in English on the lunch line at the museum cafe.

None.

And note the spelling,

A misspelled word that brought up a very strong memory from a long time ago. We were in the 4th grade, or maybe the 3rd. But whenever it was, Trina Monsod was still my classmate. There was a spelling bee that was to be held amongst all the grades and there was an elimination in our class. As a contestant, I was in front of the room, blackboard to my back, facing the class with Trina Monsod directly in front of me. The word was clear enough, pronounced loud and slow by the teacher. And...I did NOT know how to spell it, I had certainly ridden one to expert levels for a third grader but I didn't know how to spell the damn word. Trina saw this and mouthed to me: buy-sigh-cull. And I went: B-Y-C-I-C-L-E.

I don't even know if Trina remembers this little story from 30 years ago, but thank you Trina. She and I have become a lawyer and a doctor, resepctively, and photographers.

But academically having proven myself, I can't help but think it was really a hard word to spell!

6.4, Left to Right Choreography

That was the magnitude of the earthquake that woke me. It was 4:13 this morning but the day was fully bright already. The bed was shaking, left to right. The thought that woke me was not that there was an earthquake but that it was moving me just in the left to right direction. Then I heard the doors to the other rooms opening and the window shades being drawn, and my neighbors in the hallways.

But not a peep from the Japs. They used to it I guess.

I am deathly afraid of earthquakes, but only in the Philippines. Here, I figure the Japanese are such control freaks that they've figured out every way to avert human disaster from earthquakes. They invented the giant ball bearings under buildings right? So a 6.4 magnitude quake hits Tokyo and is felt at 4.5 in Kyoto (where I was), and the whole city sleeps through it. In Manila, brown out na 'yan tapos may nahulog na building na.

Hotels

This was the lobby of where I came from. Very comfortable hotel found on Tablet. That was in Kyoto.

Now, am in a city called Kanazawa which is very popular amongst Japanese (castles, samurai, a contemporary art museum called Kanazawa 21) but since the shinkansen hasn't reached here, very few other tourists. So am here to 'research'. That's apparently what it says on my form letter in Japanese that I hand over to people to introduce myself. The Japan Foundation people made this for me. Am pretty excited to move back to looking at our century with Kanazawa 21 after a week of looking at the Japanese answer to the Middle Ages (though they will insist, and I agree, they were much more progressive than Europeans).

So, after a 4.5 hour bus ride, I arrive in my hotel. And there was some confusion as to the reservation, but being it was the only one not written in Japanese, it had to be mine: Ro-ise Loilengo was the name. Yup, that's me.

Gardens

This is probably a blasphemous thought, but all I could think of while walking through these magnificent gardens manicured to the millimeter, was they look like golf courses! But with really old bonsai trees.

Imperial Palace garden, looks like a short par 3.


Another par 3 at the Nijo Palace gardens.



Honmura Palace aka the Clubhouse


I think I need to start playing golf again.

Palaces and Temples

In Kyoto, hit the palaces--

the Nijo Castle with the nightingale floorboards, home of Tokugawa Ieyasu, probably the most famous shogun of Japan. This is actually a new building on the edge of the grounds, I like the trees.

the Imperial Palace where the tenno (Emperor) and co. lived for 500+ years... it took a personal appearance with passport to get on the list to tour it. Tour is free. But a bit of a hassle, and on a wet day like yesterday, a bigger hassle. But well worth it. Hey, I wouldn't mind living there if I was the Emperor. The structures are straightforward and simply designed, but the materials and the workmanship are exquisite. And the gardens are perfect.

the Golden Pavilion, a temple that was burned down repeatedly by jealous monks. Finally restored in the last century, with several centimiters thick of real gold leafing. Gold leafing is big in Japan.

but really, all people do when they get to these places...

I wonder if people still even bother to look at what they came to see in the first place, or just take pictures.

"Are You a Traveller?"

I arrived yesterday in Kyoto.

I walked into a bonesetter's clinic and this was his question this evening. He looked like a physical therapist to me, with a foot stencilled on the glass of his clinic. I figured he was a reflexologist, or a PT, he insisted he was a bonesetter. I suppose he was like orthopedic surgeons who cast broken bones. But without the casts. Anyway, too much of a language barrier but my feet were crying out to the stencilled sign for a massage. He agreed to 'set my foot'. The price agreed on, I lay down and he went to work. I was asleep in minutes. It was very nice. At the end of it, he asked me if I had a website, so we sat there making gestures about shashin (photography) while looking at the gallery website.

Last night, I watched Bunraku at the National Bunraku Theater in Osaka (which is 29 minutes away from Kyoto by train). Bunraku is four century old puppet theater that makes the muppets look really kawawa. They played Shakespeare's The Tempest-- the narrator who speaks and emotes all the parts, the three puppeteers to each puppet who are all hooded and in black, and the shimasen player who acts as conductor but is not allowed to have any facial expressions. The audience had a median age of 70. I was one of the few who was not in a kimono. The shimasen players were all National Living Treasures and the Bunraku is one of Unesco's protected Intangible Cultural Heritage. It was finely done, iba talaga.

In the last three days, I have slept in these three beds.
Last night at the Hyatt Regency

I was so happy to final be in a room with a television after one month of no TV. Only to find out that the two English language channels, CNN and BBC, are dubbed in Japanese. Christian Amanpour in Nihonggo not a good match. Here talaga, no space for outsiders.

The night before, at the attic of the Yoshimizu Ryokan in Mayamura Park, Kyoto.

There is a picture that accompanies this. It is of the view of the bamboo grove the room looks into. I took it with a polaroid. The photo is filled with hundreds of orbs. I stayed in this room one night, and don't think I'm going back there again. Too many things going on that I could not see.

And the night before that, at the Benesse House Park, Naoshima.


The rests have been good, but my dreams in the middle room were very disturbing. Won't go into the details as I would really rather forget.

Here, have some matcha ice cream.

Filipinas: Cory

I photographed Mrs. Aquino in 2005 as part of my FILIPINAS series. She arrived early for the shoot, and had a bodyguard along with her carrying 2 sets of clothes. One set was cream, the other was yellow. Which really did not matter since they both translate into a whiter shade of grey in black and white, so I chose yellow of course.

The shoot went fairly quickly. I asked her what her life would've been like if she hadn't become President. Her answer, "well, what would my life have been like if they hadn't killed my husband?". Enough said. It was inevitable, the Presidency. She also mentioned that the last time she had been in a studio setting like that, it was as Time Magazine's Man of the Year.

The whole thing was done in fifteen minutes. I must have shot about five rolls. This is the photograph that ultimately made it to the show, and to the book. The book I am very proud off; the show I am very grateful to have assembled with DOR such a strong set of women to learn from and be inspired by.

As she was leaving, she stopped and turned around and said, ' doesn't your family own Pancake House?'. To which I say that a brother does, to which she says, 'they always run out of food in the Tarlac branch. I ate there last week with Japanese guests and they ran out of batter.'

So human, and so down to earth.

Goodbye Mrs. Aquino, thank you.

Big in Japan: Tahimik-san at Echigo-Tsumari

Look who I saw in the Echigo-Tsumari Art Triennial that opened last weekend: Kidlat the Father, also known here as Tahimik-san. They certainly stood out, all 15 of them, in their bahags and Ifugao wear. Tatay and crew (including Kabu and Ruel) participated at the Triennale up in the mountains of Niigata, the only art festival spread out over 700 square kilometers, by building an Ifugao house in the rice paddies up there. He calls it his Love Letter to Japan.

Do not be deceived though about the mountain weather, it was incredibly hot. Sauna hot, humidity at 90%. It was not pleasant. But the scale of the festival was amazing. Over 250 artists from all over the world come and make work to leave in this mountain region whose population has gradually depleted since the war. Many homes are abandoned, and many rice fields have grown over. Every 3 years since 2000, thousands come to see these art installations in the homes that have been converted into exhibition spaces and participate in this one of a kind art show. The great thing about it is that it is very much community-based, and there seems to be an equality amongst artists. Something that the heavily commercial Venice Biennale seems to have lost. There, the galleries are front center with the artists in credit at the captions; here, that artists are identified by country, and medium of art.


Antony Gormley creates a permanent installation "Another Singularity" for an old vacant house.


Japanese artist makes outline cut outs in iron of all the living members of the village.


Boltanski and Kalman transform a school gymnasium into straw floor + electric fans + lightbulbs. The smell of the straw was sweet and happily overpowering. Nice when unexpecteds come out of work like that.


Bankart House. They house artists and make furniture. This year they made baths.


Trippy trip... there was a school that was down to 3 students from a high of thousands, they closed it. So Japanese cartoonist makes story book about these 3 students that centered on a ghost who fed on children's memories being hungry. Trip.


Then the Herb Man project. They planted it, self explanatory. Can you see the man? It was really muddy. Fun.

Trees

I am finally taking pictures. After three weeks in Tokyo of meeting people, and going around to galleries and museums and all that that. I have picked up the camera and started shooting. And thinking about what I'm shooting. I have also started my trip called Japan West.

Over the weekend, I was in Hiroshima. Went to see the Peace Museum. Heartbreaking and HEAVY stuff. I could not stop praying the whole time I was there (and believe me, I am no saint). Major headache after, needed LOTS of water. Took several photographs of the tattered and (bloody) clothing of victims that were on show. But NONE of them came out, at least none registered on my camera drive. How weird. The only photo that came out:


Glass melted by the explosion, surface temperatures reached 4,000 degrees centigrade. I cannot imagine.

Back to photography: I love trees. I love shooting trees. They were my first photographic subject years ago. I was in a darkroom class, and I had to take some pictures so I exposed my first roll on trees in Central Park. Sounds cheesy, but am still shooting trees ten years later. I've made tree photos from Bontoc to Bhutan, from Kyoto to Whistler, from New York to Bukidnon. One day, I'll put them all together.

Art Graveyard

It took a shinkansen ride (bullet train), a regular train ride, a walk, and a ferry ride to get to where I am. Naoshima Island on the inland Seto Sea, in the Benesse House run by the Fukutake Foundation. The architecture of the Benesse House buildings and museums is by Tadao Ando. It is essentially a resort, but a museum at the same time. The draw, and uniqueness, is living in a museum.



The art is by the best of our times. Jasper Johns to Basquiat, Sugimoto to Richard Long to Bruce Nauman. And that's just indoors, outdoors are sculptural pieces, like a land of the lost but for art. Kusama, Turrell, more Sugimoto. It is wonderful but eerie. I heard that Museums are a place where artwork goes to die. Well, with Ando's cement architecture, in this place, art has come to be buried.

When Yayoi and Cory Met

I am in Naoshima Island on the Seto Sea, in the middle of Japan. It is filled with art installations, mostly conceptual pieces with stairs by Walter de Maria and light views by James Turrell. I am very much sad with Cory's death. Found this giant pumpkin on the beach, a yellow and black polka dot pumpkin by Yayoi Kusama. It is my remembering Cory moment on this summer day.