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Craft
Documentary
#masks
#Course of X
#video
#wooden
#woodworking
Noh is the earliest theatrical artwork kind in Japan and remains to be carried out right now. Developed within the 14th century, it usually focuses on tales wherein a supernatural being has reworked right into a human and is narrated from the hero’s perspective. A core side of the costumes is very stylized Noh masks, which symbolize characters like deities, ghosts, and different figures, subtly emphasizing expression and emotion as their wearers flip within the gentle. A brief documentary by Course of X explores how the craft of carving the props by hand is stored alive by artisans like Mitsue Nakamura.
Beginning with a block of Japanese cypress, Nakamura chisels the spherical face, eyes, nostril, and tooth. Coated with a lacquer historically derived from crushed seashells combined with glue, the shape is then dried earlier than being pierced on either side with a scorching axe to tie strings via. The artist mixes pigments by hand so as to add coloration to the options, together with blackening the tooth in a follow referred to as ohaguro, a trend that was standard in Japan through the Heian interval.
For some households and establishments, Noh carries a timeless and essential legacy, and lots of traditionally important and invaluable masks, comparable to these made by the Fifteenth-century Konparu college, are preserved in collections. “The time period ‘face like a Noh masks’ is usually used as a metaphor for expressionlessness, however the main attribute of the world of Noh is that it expresses human emotions and inside ideas somewhat than storytelling,” says Nakamura in a press release. “The higher the masks is, the extra the expression adjustments with a slight distinction in angle.”
Course of X continuously goes behind the scenes with makers and artisans, together with on this video documenting the making of inventive manhole covers in Japan. (by way of Kottke)
#masks
#Course of X
#video
#wooden
#woodworking
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