Critical reflection



The project research is started from the personal interest of Japanese traditional tattoos. As the cutting point, the beginning of the project starts with searching a useful idea from the personal interests. It is believed, the one with special personality will attract more attention in the crowd. In other words, a special personality can inspire more characteristic and unique ideas. Therefore, at the beginning of the research, I start with a few personal hobbies from mine and friends’ around in order to grasp different characteristic ideas, such as video gaming, movies, travelling, cooking, sports, and so on. At last, I found the wonderful idea through the hobby of mine, the Japanese traditional tattoos.

There are several reasons to choose this subject as the main idea of my project. Firstly, since I came to London for my degree study, it is really easy to find that the londoners are the tattoo lovers. There are so many people wearing tattoos walking on streets, proudly and comfortably. This is a situation that totally different from China, as it is heard, so does even in Japan. It brings a lot of cultural impact to me and really opens my mind. Secondly, when it is my first time attending to the International London Tattoo Convention, I met my Irezumi tattoo artist Leon, and started my deep connection with Japanese traditional tattoos, specially with the Horiyoshi III family. During my tattoo procedure, from the communication with Leon, I learnt a lot about the Horiyoshi III family, and his tattoo art pursuits. The tattoo art works and his aesthetic spirits have deeply impressed me. Finally, I also find that even Horiyoshi III is known by the West nowadays, however, he is only known inside the tattoo art craft industry, even only to whom is interested in Japanese tattoo styles. There are both a demand and a chance to unite his fans for such a living legent. It is also a good opportunity to transmit the Japanese traditional culture which is one of the venerable outstanding asian cultures through this permanent art form on human body.  

Coming to the project planning, it was a strong concertation work at first, focusing on Horiyoshi III family subject, and then it became to a massive work for accomplishing the fans club idea. Firstly, in order to be aware as much as possible about Horiyoshi III  himself and his tattoo aesthetic spirits, the plan tries to grasp everything related to him or his family. At this step, it is really helpful that I get to know with Leon who has a tight connection with Horiyoshi family as an apprentice to the one who is already a direct apprentice under Horiyoshi III himself. Following the step, the research learnt about Horiyoshi III’s tattoo art works and his aspiration. Furthermore, I learnt about the extending of related business with his tattoo art figures, and the museum he established. So far, we can see the development that have been done by Horiyoshi III and his students, is well spreading out from the East to the West step by step. Therefore, the following plan of the project takes this diffusion of Horiyoshi III family as a lead to continue for the club plan being practical. Practically, the plan is depending on more specific organization and consideration as business planning. However, for the reason that the priority goal of the club is only creating a happy spot for the fans, uniting them together, and the cultural communication. Hence the club is decided to be a nonprofit community.

Practically, at the beginning of the design project development, it is a hard way to proceed. Basing on the Zen spiritual understanding of Horiyoshi III, the first idea comes to me is the traditional Japanese temple which is having so many religion characters. However, the figure of temple is too complex and hard to be abstracted into a classy symbol. Therefore, the idea cannot go further, and the project has to reconsider more Japanese traditional elements, specially related to the tattoo figures.

Speaking to the highlighted figures and images of traditional Japanese tattoos, there are specifically a few, such as the oriental dragon, oriental lion(cici), peony, oriental cherry(sakura), and the different warriors in Japanese history and traditional legends. It takes a lot of time to try these figures into the design. During the process, it appears that there are too many elements I want to present in the design. This attempt makes thing like a mess. Hence, I stopped and returned to the primary spiritual artistic aspiration from Horiyoshi the third himself. Fortunately, the best idea comes out in a short while. It is inspired by the traditional seal of Horiyoshi III’s signature. The seal is used formally by Horiyoshi III on his tattoo works when it is the IREZUMI-the whole body tattoo works. It becomes the specific symbol for Horiyoshi III’s master pieces day by day. It is believed as a glory representation of Horiyoshi III. Therefore, nothing will be better than the seal form to represent the family which is deeply believe in the Horiyoshi III’s tattoo art and his spiritual aspiration.

To decide the colour and tone of the design is not so hard as for the main figure. Going back to the Zen spirit, Horiyoshi III and his family is dedicated to keeping  “the traditional Japanese Zen based spirit of Kokoro-a simple translation would be heart or mind and in the emotional sense spirit, courage, affection and inner meaning-Alive.” In the Japanese traditional culture, Green is the color of fertility and growth. In addition, Green can also represent eternity, since evergreen trees never lose their leaves or stop growing. Hence, the logo design takes colour Green as it endows the design with the alive soul. In order to keep it pure, the design choose to keep the whole works simply in one single colour. Moreover, the pure and clean design also represents a well known ideal of Japanese design industry-Less for More.

When the whole project is nearly finished, I sent the design to my tattoo artist Leon who is the first apprentice of Alex Reinke (Horikitsune aka) for testing and reviews. Basing on his tattoo profession, Leon is nicely to give me a lot of professional advices and feedbacks. It is a welcome design for him as he has the same hope to spread out the Japanese traditional tattoo arts spirits. The specific design details are satisfied him for representing rightly the Horiyoshi III’s tattoo arts and spirits. However, he hopes the design can go further and show more about the cultural connotations of Japanese tradition. He said it may be more enriched but not emphasizing only the pure in the details of elements. This is a very good advice and really helpful for me to develop the project. I have made a few changes of the design base on Leon’s suggestion, but it seems need more works. I wish there is more time to enrich it more.    

To conclude, the final design project has brought me a lot of knowledge and experience in the whole design process and communicating with people. During the project running, it is surprised me that even I am the Chinese person, the communication with Chinese investors still need a lot of explanation and understanding. Because the place and environment we stay differently, it needs me to interpretate the idea in a totally different way for them. Even with such an endeavor, it can not be sure that the idea will be accepted. This problem makes me facing a tragedy that I need to start a brand new project over again. Therefore, the first thing I learnt is the control of time and the communication skills. At the following period of the design project, I start it over from the beginning, but I find it is my favourite. In despite of the profound culture base of this design subject, it also has substantial contents. It is confirmed and approved that it is right to stick closely to the profound Zen spirit of Kokoro of Horiyoshi III’s believes. The elements with such a believe keeps the whole design in communicating overall tone and quality. If it needs to be start over again, I think I will pay more attention on enriching the design in every details so that it can be more capable to represent the rich and colourful Japanese traditional tattoo arts world. 
















Bibliography

Books

Carlier, Chris. "Seek Japan: Yokohama Tattoo Museum." Seek Japan. http://www.seekjapan.jp/article/jz/856/Yokohama+Tattoo+Museum (accessed September 11, 2011).

Kitamura, Takahiro, and Katie M. Kitamura. Bushido: legacies of the Japanese tattoo. New York: Schiffer, 2000.

Kitamura, Takahiro. Tattoos of the floating world: ukiyo-e motifs in the Japanese tattoo. Amsterdam: Hotei Pub., 2003.


Internate Sources

Mathers, Cassandra. "What Is the Meaning of Color in Japanese Culture? | eHow.com." eHow.com. http://www.ehow.com/about_6658499_meaning-color-japanese-culture_.html (accessed September 13, 2011).

Reinke, Alex. "Horikitsune." HOLIFOX. http://www.holyfoxtattoos.de/holyfox/ (accessed September 11, 2011).

Reinke, Alex. "Horiyoshi the third." HOLIFOX. http://www.holyfoxtattoos.de/holyfox/ (accessed September 11, 2011).

"Less is more", Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Less_is_more, (accessed September 11, 2011).