The 3rd Future of Hanging Scrolls and Paintings Exhibition, Introduction of Exhibited Works [Part 1

these is an exhibition of works organized by “Hyosuikai,” an Edo-Mounting research group, of which I (Atsushi Mukasa) am a member,

The exhibition, “The 3rd Future Exhibition of Hanging Scrolls and Paintings,” hosted by the Hyosuikai, an Edo mounting research group, of which I am a member, ended the other day with great success.

I also exhibited one of my new hanging scrolls and a work that I created for the 2nd Mirai Exhibition.

I also exhibited one new hanging scroll and two works from the 2nd Mirai Exhibition.

Please refer to Omoteshikai’s blog for an explanation of this future exhibition and what kind of works will be exhibited,

Please take a look here (from the early stages of planning to just before the exhibition) and here (during the exhibition).

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Here are the works I exhibited this time.

It was the first time for me to make a hanging scroll in a shape other than square, or rather, I had never seen or heard of a hanging scroll in a shape other than square,

I have never seen or heard of a non-square hanging scroll, and even when I searched on the Internet, I could not find a non-square hanging scroll.

I could not find any axes of any shape other than square.

It was well received by those who came to the show, and the general feeling was, “You made a great one, lol” (laughs).

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January 16, 2022, seven months after the opening of the Future Exhibition.

29 paintings were sent to Hyosuikai by ・ graduate students of art college.

It was an important day to decide which painting would be made into a hanging scroll.

Each mounting artist wrote the number of the painting he or she wanted to be in charge of on a piece of paper and voted for the person who would be in charge if there were no other applicants.

If there is no one else who wants to be in charge, that person will be in charge. these is a computer system.

I was interested in this picture at first glance.

If there is a curve in the paper used for hanging scrolls, it is in the shape of a fan or an uchiwa fan.

Other than that, I have never seen curved paper.

I have never seen this paper with curves before.

Moreover, this painting is cut out with a snaky curved line around the perimeter.

To be honest, at this point, I had no idea what kind of hanging scroll I would make.

Since these was an exhibition advocating “the future of hanging scrolls,” I had no choice but to try a painting that no one had ever seen before,

I decided to take on the challenge of creating a painting that no one had ever seen before, and these was my first choice.

The result was a successful bid!

It was decided that I would be in charge of this painting.

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January 23, 2022.

these was the day of the meeting with the artist who painted this picture, Nelson ・ Ho ・ Eachen.

Normally, when a painting is to be made into a hanging scroll, the artist would ask us what kind of strips to use and in what form,

The artist will give us detailed specifications such as what kind of material to use, what shape to use, and so on.

However, in the case of a future exhibition of hanging scrolls and paintings, just as the paintings are the work of the artist,

The mounting part is also the work of the mounting artist.

Therefore, we dare not ask the painter what colors and shapes he would like to use.

I do not ask the painter what color or shape he/she wants to use.

just what the painting means and what the background of the painting is.

To avoid this, a meeting is set up between the artist and the mounting artist.

Nelson asks the artist about the meaning of the painting, deepens his understanding, and develops an image for the mounting.

There was one point I wanted to confirm.

In the case of non-square paper, such as the aforementioned fan and fan-shaped paper, the paper is stretched on a square piece of paper called a mat, and then shaped into shape,

The paper is then shaped and made into a kakejiku.

We asked Nelson about the pros and cons of this mounting.

The answer was, “Since we chose this shape for the painting, we prefer it not to be square.”

I know, right? I agree.

It would have been so much easier if they had asked me to put it on a base paper and make it square,

I was a little relieved that I was not told to do so.

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But from here, the days of suffering begin.

I was really worried about how to make it into a hanging scroll, since I had never seen this paper in this form before.

What I arrived at was not to think about a hanging scroll, but to think purely about the shape and colors that would make the best use of this painting.

The title of this painting is “Best regards.

The anxiety and worry of embarking on a new love affair and all the bad experiences I have had keep replaying in my head like a wave of nightmares,

But as long as the other person takes my hand, we can overcome any major problems together,

This painting was drawn with this in mind.

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Based on this, I devised a design on my PC.

Here is what I came up with.

We decided to use white, gray, and red for the surrounding ripples to take advantage of the colors of this paper.

The shape of the strips was designed to look like the swirls depicted in the painting, as well as the flowers in the hands of the two artists.

As a buffer zone between the eccentric paper and the eccentric sAKI, we decided to include three layers of “matsubi” inspired by the shape of the paper.

Unlike the aforementioned square mounts, the three layers of “mounts” were designed to fit the shape of the original paper.

It is an irregular mount those is in line with the shape of the main paper.

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Kakejiku for the alcove, and frames and panels for the living room in Western-style ・

Basically, they are square in shape.

In the spirit of “hanging scrolls of the future,” it would be good to have a hanging scroll with a curved outer circumference,

these is one of the reasons why we decided on this design.

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Next, determine the dimensions.

The original size is projected on a projector, and how many strips and mounts are appropriate for the paper is determined.

The projector was used to verify how many tears and mounts were appropriate for the paper.

And so, the dimensions were determined.

Next, we choose the tear to be used and the paper for the mount.

We have aligned them like this.

And so far, we’ve only thought about making the most of this paper.

I have been thinking only about making the best use of this paper, but now I am beginning to wonder if I can really make a hanging scroll in such a shape. （I was wondering if I could really make a hanging scroll in this form.)

Even if I could, I wondered if the circles on either side of the scroll would not be too big when it was hung.

In a normal hanging scroll, the shaft rod extends beyond the total width of the scroll, which creates tension across the entire split,

these allows the entire tear to be tensioned and hung neatly.

In contrast, the present hanging scroll has a circular split outside of the shaft rod, which means that there is no tension on that part.

Since there is no precedent and no information that could be used as a reference, we decided to make a prototype and verify it for the time being.

Hmm? Surprisingly, it looks ok.

It looks like the split will be even more sticky than this design.

I tried to make it more sticky than this design, but it seems to be totally fine.

It is easier to give birth than to worry.

So we decided to go ahead with this design! I decided to go ahead with this design.

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The first step is to stretch the base paper around the main paper (picture).

In order to make the base paper in an irregular shape, a mold was made from cardboard.

these is used to complete the mounting around the main paper.

Next is the tearing section.

Hmm? No, the part of the cleft, I had no idea how to make it.

these is going to be a long story.

The second part is here.