Busy few days (with Bunraku photos)
May. 4th, 2011 01:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
foxinthestarsHaven't posted since Saturday when I said I was doing Reading Deprivation week, well, apparently my first gambit for dealing with it was just to stay too busy to read anyway.
Sunday of course I had church, and that was also the day we (the church Art Committee) were changing out the poster display, so I stayed and worked on that for some time.
Monday, since the Bunraku troupe just luckily happened to be performing when I was there to see the poster and attend, I decided to go for it, and since church is along the way, I came in to help more with the poster exhibit. Only two of us were there, Patt and I, but we got a lot done. I also stopped by Hobby Lobby for something and while there was tempted by a drawing desk that was on sale, but I decided to think more on it, and when I told Patt, she very generously offered me a drawing desk she had but didn't need, she just needs some time to get it out, but I really appreciate that and it was nice little bit of synchronicity. We brainstormed some things to put up after the posters, but we'll need more people to come to any decision about that.
I had a bit of an adventure, though; she led me out to her house in the residential streets to look at the desk and make sure I liked it (I did; I don't need anything fancy), then tried directing me out a different way, and I thought I'd try it... And I got really quite lost, ended up in downtown Jefferson City, where I had probably never been in my life (the parents and I don't usually venture beyond the main highway with the big-box stores). I finally pulled into a parking spot, checked a map, and found my way back to familiar territory. It was stressful at the time, but in hindsight I think I handled it pretty well.
And I still got to Columbia in plenty of time for the Bunraku! It was put on by Bunraku Bay a group of American performers based there in Columbia (mostly students in the Japanese department at the university---the very department I attended a few years too early for it). Usually, they said, they perform with the Japanese company that mentors them, and this was the time they were having a full length performance of their own in Columbia. The music and voice work was recorded for the most part, but they did all the puppetry and it was definitely something to see! I won't do the whole rundown, just explain the pictures.
Here are two puppets who were displayed outside but weren't in the show. At the feet of the older woman you'll see a couple of their t-shirts (and yes, I did get one of the forest green ones).
First was Sanbaso, the dancer who blesses the theater and the audience at the start of the performance. (In the second picture you'll see his excited face; more on this later.)
Later came the Lion Dance; this is the lion head in the hands of the puppet Lion Dancer:
Sanbaso and the Lion Dancer came out and interacted with the audience, which was great fun; in particular, getting bitten on the head by the lion is supposed to confer intelligence, good fortune, and long life; I was too far from the aisle to get bitten during the performance, but I made sure to get a nip outside afterward (when all but the first of the photos were taken).
The last piece was Hidakagawa Iriaizakura, in which a woman, Kiyohime, is transformed into a demon by jealousy (I believe I had seen a version of the same story on a DVD I got from Netflix once, a collection of short stop-motion films by a Japanese director whose name I don't remember...). During the piece, she would throw her head forward or disappear beneath the water when she changed to and from her demon form, and the change is so radical it was a mystery how it worked (the same way as Sanbaso's "wow" face), but afterward the puppeteer was happy to show it off, and for this I had to get a video:
After the performance, Sanbaso's puppeteer was also letting people try handling him, so of course I had to give it a shot. I was surprised to find that the Bunraku puppets don't have full bodies; they seem to be mostly costume with body parts as needed. The head is on a handle which goes through shoulders heavy enough to stay in place as the head swivels around, and a pull-cord on the neck/handle controls the facial movements (Sanbaso's "wow" and Kiyohime's demon transformation). Some of them had mechanical arms and hands that would flex expressively with more pull-cord mechanisms, but in the case of Sanbaso, because he holds and manipulates bells and a fan in his dance (or Ebisu, who I didn't get a picture of but who played a guitar in a little improv comedy bit), the puppeteers just put their own hands into his sleeves (as you can see in the second picture of Sanbaso). The feet are also attached and detached as needed, and adult women usually don't have feet, the puppeteers just move her kimono.
At any rate, it was very fun and interesting and I'm glad I got to see it. I did get home quite late, though.
After that, Tuesday was my day to go to the nearer-by Art Guild; it was kind of a wild day there (the day of our monthly meeting), but I got a couple of Artist Cards done, and after the meeting we had a somewhat-impromptu tie-dye session, where I did a couple of shirts. I'll have to post pictures of the cards and shirts later...
Being so busy, I had neglected my Aria of Sorrow game for a couple of days in a particularly bad place, so last night I forged ahead a bit---to an even more particularly bad place ("at Death's Door", pun obligatory---last time through I remember that I drank some potions but he didn't kill me, so I shouldn't dread him so, but...). Some time ago, though, I realized that this particular game of Aria I intend to just play through it and then delete the save, so I didn't need all the souls---and more recently I realized I didn't need all the items, or even 100% map (since the condition for the good ending on this one is much more obscure than that), so that one room where the floor is nothing but spikes and you have to cross it on nothing but swinging pendulums that Medusa heads are trying to knock you off of and the payoff for this is a sword that I don't even remember using? Yeah, screw that.
Having kept so busy, today is really the first day that I'll be truly confronting the Reading Deprivation. But I guess blogging is one thing to do instead...
Sunday of course I had church, and that was also the day we (the church Art Committee) were changing out the poster display, so I stayed and worked on that for some time.
Monday, since the Bunraku troupe just luckily happened to be performing when I was there to see the poster and attend, I decided to go for it, and since church is along the way, I came in to help more with the poster exhibit. Only two of us were there, Patt and I, but we got a lot done. I also stopped by Hobby Lobby for something and while there was tempted by a drawing desk that was on sale, but I decided to think more on it, and when I told Patt, she very generously offered me a drawing desk she had but didn't need, she just needs some time to get it out, but I really appreciate that and it was nice little bit of synchronicity. We brainstormed some things to put up after the posters, but we'll need more people to come to any decision about that.
I had a bit of an adventure, though; she led me out to her house in the residential streets to look at the desk and make sure I liked it (I did; I don't need anything fancy), then tried directing me out a different way, and I thought I'd try it... And I got really quite lost, ended up in downtown Jefferson City, where I had probably never been in my life (the parents and I don't usually venture beyond the main highway with the big-box stores). I finally pulled into a parking spot, checked a map, and found my way back to familiar territory. It was stressful at the time, but in hindsight I think I handled it pretty well.
And I still got to Columbia in plenty of time for the Bunraku! It was put on by Bunraku Bay a group of American performers based there in Columbia (mostly students in the Japanese department at the university---the very department I attended a few years too early for it). Usually, they said, they perform with the Japanese company that mentors them, and this was the time they were having a full length performance of their own in Columbia. The music and voice work was recorded for the most part, but they did all the puppetry and it was definitely something to see! I won't do the whole rundown, just explain the pictures.
Here are two puppets who were displayed outside but weren't in the show. At the feet of the older woman you'll see a couple of their t-shirts (and yes, I did get one of the forest green ones).
First was Sanbaso, the dancer who blesses the theater and the audience at the start of the performance. (In the second picture you'll see his excited face; more on this later.)
Later came the Lion Dance; this is the lion head in the hands of the puppet Lion Dancer:
Sanbaso and the Lion Dancer came out and interacted with the audience, which was great fun; in particular, getting bitten on the head by the lion is supposed to confer intelligence, good fortune, and long life; I was too far from the aisle to get bitten during the performance, but I made sure to get a nip outside afterward (when all but the first of the photos were taken).
The last piece was Hidakagawa Iriaizakura, in which a woman, Kiyohime, is transformed into a demon by jealousy (I believe I had seen a version of the same story on a DVD I got from Netflix once, a collection of short stop-motion films by a Japanese director whose name I don't remember...). During the piece, she would throw her head forward or disappear beneath the water when she changed to and from her demon form, and the change is so radical it was a mystery how it worked (the same way as Sanbaso's "wow" face), but afterward the puppeteer was happy to show it off, and for this I had to get a video:
After the performance, Sanbaso's puppeteer was also letting people try handling him, so of course I had to give it a shot. I was surprised to find that the Bunraku puppets don't have full bodies; they seem to be mostly costume with body parts as needed. The head is on a handle which goes through shoulders heavy enough to stay in place as the head swivels around, and a pull-cord on the neck/handle controls the facial movements (Sanbaso's "wow" and Kiyohime's demon transformation). Some of them had mechanical arms and hands that would flex expressively with more pull-cord mechanisms, but in the case of Sanbaso, because he holds and manipulates bells and a fan in his dance (or Ebisu, who I didn't get a picture of but who played a guitar in a little improv comedy bit), the puppeteers just put their own hands into his sleeves (as you can see in the second picture of Sanbaso). The feet are also attached and detached as needed, and adult women usually don't have feet, the puppeteers just move her kimono.
At any rate, it was very fun and interesting and I'm glad I got to see it. I did get home quite late, though.
After that, Tuesday was my day to go to the nearer-by Art Guild; it was kind of a wild day there (the day of our monthly meeting), but I got a couple of Artist Cards done, and after the meeting we had a somewhat-impromptu tie-dye session, where I did a couple of shirts. I'll have to post pictures of the cards and shirts later...
Being so busy, I had neglected my Aria of Sorrow game for a couple of days in a particularly bad place, so last night I forged ahead a bit---to an even more particularly bad place ("at Death's Door", pun obligatory---last time through I remember that I drank some potions but he didn't kill me, so I shouldn't dread him so, but...). Some time ago, though, I realized that this particular game of Aria I intend to just play through it and then delete the save, so I didn't need all the souls---and more recently I realized I didn't need all the items, or even 100% map (since the condition for the good ending on this one is much more obscure than that), so that one room where the floor is nothing but spikes and you have to cross it on nothing but swinging pendulums that Medusa heads are trying to knock you off of and the payoff for this is a sword that I don't even remember using? Yeah, screw that.
Having kept so busy, today is really the first day that I'll be truly confronting the Reading Deprivation. But I guess blogging is one thing to do instead...
