"Moon Score" and Japanese Avant-Garde

I'm back from Japan now two weeks and only today getting around to providing an update. It was novel flying Hawaiian Airlines from Sacramento to Honolulu and then Honolulu to Kansai International, with a 4 hour layover in Honolulu --just enough time to hop in a taxi, drive to Waikiki and jump in the crystal blue Pacific.

As shown on the map to the left, we did a full tour of the Kansai region and the Kii Peninsula, beginning in Kyoto, then to Nara, Matsusaka (my home for two years on the JET Program), then down the coast to the fishing village/hot springs town of Kii-Katsuura. We spent two days there at a lovely inn called Kosaka-ya and then went to Shirahama for two days of tropical beaches (see last photo).

In Matsusaka, we were hosted by former colleague and physics teacher, Morii-sensei. Shown to the left is my daughter, Charlotte, and my tea ceremony teacher, Imanishi-sensei. It was very familiar to return to my first home in Japan, and our hosts were incredibly generous with a dinner, lodging, and tours of Matsusaka and Ise.

My previous post mentions wanting to learn more about Izanami. I mentioned this to Imanishi-sensei, and her response was, "Why?" Suffice to say, my interests in things Japanese seem to become more obscure and historical as I get older. Another area I wanted to learn more about was the Japanese avant-garde movement of the 1950s and 1960s and whether that had any influence on art or musical improvisation. One exhibit that caught my eye in Osaka was "Moon Score" by Nomura Hitoshi (1945- ) at the International Art Museum in Osaka. He took photographs of a musical staff, rewound the film, and over those images photographed phases of the moon. Each print has a newspaper clipping from that day showing the moon phase. He then composed a musical score to the photographs. The music was playing on a loop.

With our JR passes, my daughter and I were able to squeeze in a trip to Hiroshima on our last day. We visited the Peace Memorial, the hypocenter of the nuclear blast, and the place where President Obama folded cranes. With little time remaining in the day, we made a quick stop to the Hiroshima Prefectural Art Museum and were surprised by their eclectic collection of art from the 1920s and 30s, including pieces by Picabia, Francis Bacon, and Salvador Dali.

I remember a ceramic sculpture incorporating pages of the Bible called "Rock Bible." I have tried to find a URL to link here, but the Hiroshima Prefectural Museum doesn't have photographs of its collection online.

Upon returning to California, I resolved to read the column in the Asahi Daily, Tensei Jingo (天声人語), as often as possible, transcribing it word for word in my journal, as a way to improve my reading. I also plan to return to Tokyo in the early part of next year to visit my older daughter, who is studying abroad at Wasoeda University for a year.

Pictures to the left include Charlotte at Fushimi-Inari in Kyoto; a stone Buddha at Nachi Falls in Kumano, me with a much-derided Nara mascot, Sento-kun; and finally, the picturesque beach at Rinkai-Ura Hama (臨海浦浜) in Shirahama.

Oh, and before I forget, according to the manga version of the Kojiki, Izanagi impregnated Izanami, and she gave birth to the Japanese islands (excluding Hokkaido?). She died after giving birth to the God of Fire, and from Izanagi's tears, the Goddess of Water was born.

Please correct me if I didn't get this right...