Nippon

Basically, in my photographic series of ‘Nippon’,I tried to integrate Japanese traditional artistic elements into the modern digit al art of photography. I choose cherry blossom as a motif of my pictures this time.Because the cherry blossom has been a symbol of Japanese people’s soul and has a special meaning to us since ancient times. Hideyoshi Toyotomi who is regarded as one of Japan’s great unifiers had planted 700 cherry blossoms in Daigoji-temple, Kyoto, in 1598. He invited 1300 people to this temple and held an enormous cherry blossom viewing party. He knew that the cherry blossom is so gorgeous that it never fails to grab people’s heart.He identified his glory of his achievement with the cherry blossoms and he tried to show the greatness of his power. It is the anecdote about the strong relationship between Japanese people and the cherry blossoms.In the late 1800s, at the time of the Meiji restoration, the cherry blossoms had been planted after another all over Japan. This blossom became widespread among the common people and became the spirit of our hearts.In the rapid social changing as opening the country to the world, we needed to unite against foreign countries as Japanese.During the World War I and II, the cherryblossoms became a symbol of the military virtue of which they live gracefully and never be scared of death. The life of cherry blossom is very short. It blooms all at once and falls soon. Soldiers portrayed themselves as the life of the blossoms. After the war, it became a symbol of the reconstruction and the peace.For Japanese people spring is the time to start something new. We fill our hearts with hope and dreams. As a flower of spring, we celebrate cherry blossoms. The cherry blossom keeps changing its existence value with the times. And it has remained in a broken line as the Japanese symbol until today. And it is figuratively expressed as the sense of beauty and the view of life of Japanese people.I want to express those sense by using Japanese traditional technique in a new digital art of the photographs.