If you work by reason, you grow rough-edged; if you choose to dip your oar into sentiment’s it will sweep you away. Demanding your own way only serves to constrain you. However you look at it, the human world is not an easy place to live.
And when its difficulties intensify, you find yourself longing to leave that world and dwell in some easier one – and then, when you understand at least that difficulties will dog you wherever you may live, this is when poetry and art are born.
The creators of our human world are neither gods nor demons but simply people, those ordinary folk who happen to live right there next door. You may feel the human realm is a difficult place, but there is surely no better world to live in. You will find another only by going to nonhuman; and the nonhuman realm would surely be a far more difficult place to inhabit than the human.
This morning, the wife of a nearby dry cleaner is bitten by a dog, an ambulance came, the police came, and the dog owner was sued. That was the situation.
Almost heaven, West Virginia Blue Ridge Mountains, Shenandoah River Life is old there, older than the trees Younger than the mountains, growin’ like a breeze
Country roads, take me home To the place I belong West Virginia, mountain mama Take me home, country roads
All my memories gather ’round her Miner’s lady, stranger to blue water Dark and dusty, painted on the sky Misty taste of moonshine, teardrop in my eye
Country roads, take me home To the place I belong West Virginia, mountain mama Take me home, country roads
I hear her voice in the mornin’ hour, she calls me The radio reminds me of my home far away Drivin’ down the road, I get a feelin’ That I should’ve been home yesterday, yesterday
Country roads, take me home To the place I belong West Virginia, mountain mama Take me home, country roads
Country roads, take me home To the place I belong West Virginia, mountain mama Take me home, country roads Take me home, down country roads Take me home, down country roads
However, I’m not sure where I am belonging. I have no plan to go back to Japan.
とは、言っても、私がどこに属しているのかよくわかりません。日本に帰る予定もありません。
The first time I saw Dan Graham‘s Homes For America, I was surprised because it is similar to Sapporo’s suburban residential area. However, this doesn’t need to surprise.
The development of Hokkaido is after the country’s opening, and it has not much about Japanese taste.
北海道の開拓は開国後です。日本的な趣きはあまりありません。
The Hokkaido Government Office and the clock tower in Sapporo are also Western-style buildings. Moreover, it is no exaggeration to say that Japan after World War II has been modeled after the United States. Mostly, after the war, the Constitution of Japan was created by the United States.
As I said yesterday, since Japan opened the country in 1854, they actively embraced European art and culture. However, when we started World War 2, the Japanese government banned many things from Western to the nation.
So, Yayoi Kusama wanted to learn oil painting, but she couldn’t do it, and she was studying Japanese painting. Her oil painting was self-taught, so she had difficulty doing it because of not knowing the technique.