Author: ultrawolvesunderthefullmoon

https://www.instagram.com/wolvesofgray This blog is a refugee and a survivor of the Great Tumblr Inquisition of December 17th, 2018. I am gay artist, who received training at the Rhode Island School of Design, and now, a retired high-end fine art framer living in Maryland, USA. My interests and studies in life run a wide gamut from art to history and from the scientific to the esoteric. I have been building this blog of images and texts for the last eight years. My wish is that my posts pique the interest of viewers and encourage them to experience more.

The Tantõ

Awataguchi Yoshimitsu, Tantõ, Mid-late Kamakura Period ca. 1270, Private Collection

The tantõ is a common Japanese single or, occasionally double edged  dagger with a blade length between 15 and 30 cm (6-12 inches). The tantõ was designed primarily as a stabbing instrument, but the edge can be used to slash as well.

The tantõ first began to appear in the Heian period of Japan which extended from 794 to 1185. This period was named for the location of the Imperial Capital, which was moved from Nara to Heian-Kyõ. The blades in this period lacked any artistic quality and were purely weapons.

In the early Kamakura period which ran from 1192 to 1333, high-quality artful tantõs­ began to appear. This Kamakura period brought the emergence of shogun rule. Japanese warlods, shoguns, claimed power from the hereditary monarchy and their scholar-courtiers, giving the Samurai warriors and their lords ultimate control of the early Japanese Empire.

Awataguchi Yoshimitsu was born  around 1229, the son of Awataguchi Kuniyoshi who had founded the Awataguchi School of Kyoto, considered one of the brightest lights in the world of Japanese swords. Yoshimitsu is considered the greatest maker of the tantõ in history. His blades were the most expensive at that time; one thousand pieces of gold were known to have been given to acquire one of his works.

Brice Hardelin

Brice Hardelin, Four Images from Photo Shoots, Models Unknown

Born in Germany in 1971, Brice Hardelin began his career in New York in the early 1990s, first as a textile designer, and then as a high fashion photographer. He has since become a renowned specialist in male beauty through his unique graphic style and use of lighting. He oollaborates with famous names in luxury items such as Chanel and Cartier, as well as new creators. He has to his credit over twenty solo exhibitions in Paris, New York, Milan, Lisbon and Monaco.

 

Sean Litchfield, “Jonathan #2”

Sean Litchfield, “Jonathan #2, Brooklyn”, 2014

Sean Litchfield is a Brooklyn-based architecture and interiors, editorial and landscape photographer. He draws on a deep and intimate connection with ordinary environments to produce earnest and beautiful images that evoke the deep sense of uneasiness that marks the contemporary landscape.

Through work made across the United States, Litchfield uses traditional landscape tropes to explore the modern environment. This sensibility carries over into a strong body of architecture and interior, and editorial photography. In this work, ordinary scenes are rendered extraordinary, evocative and memorable through his sense of subtle unease.

A Cape Cod native, Litchfield holds a BS in Photography. He works in large and medium format film as well as digital and is available for commissions worldwide.

Image with thanks to the artist’s site : http://seanlitchfield.com

Jack London: “Deep in the Forest, A Call Was Sounding”

Photographer Unknown, (A Call Was Sounding)

“Deep in the forest a call was sounding, and as often as he heard this call, mysteriously thrilling and luring, he felt compelled to turn his back upon the fire and the beaten earth around it, and to plunge into the forest, and on and on, he knew not where or why; nor did he wonder where or why, the call sounding imperiously, deep in the forest.”

-Jack London, The Call of the Wild

Egon Schiele

Works by Egon Schiele

Born on June 12 of 1890, Egon Schiele was an Austrian painter and a  protégé of Gustav Klimt. Schiele was a major figurative painter of the early 20th century, noted for the intensity and the raw sexuality of his work.He produced many self-portraits, of which many were naked self-portraits.  The twisted body shapes and the expressive line that characterize Schiele’s paintings and drawings mark the artist as an early exponent of Expressionism.

Eloi Biosca, “Córrer 2”

 

Eloi Biosca, “Córrer 2 (Running 2)”, 2014, Running Time 3:18 Minutes

“He was mastered by the sheer surging of life, the tidal wave of being, the perfect joy of each separate muscle, joint, and sinew in that it was everything that was not death, that it was aglow and rampant, expressing itself in movement, flying exultantly under the stars.     —Jack London, The Call of the Wild

In Eloi Biosca’s slow-motion film “Córrer 2”,  a naked athlete appears running along a pathway. This video is a celebration of the beauty of the male nude body as it runs in absolute freedom, in a natural and wild environment. The body movements are a powerful stimulus for the spectator to experience aesthetic pleasure and sensuality.

The film was first screened at the First Festival Cindeporte of Oaxaca, Mexico, in 2014. Since then, it has been shown in multiple festivals throughout the world, including those in Spain, Germany, Norway and Peru.

Note: Other films produced by Eloi Biosca can be found on Vimeo.

 

Cai Guo-Qiang

Cai Guo-Qiang:  Installations

Cai Guo-Qiang was born in 1957 in Quanzhou, China. He was trained in stage design at the Shanghai Theatre Academy from 1981 to 1985, and his work has since crossed multiple mediums within art including drawing, installation, video, and performance.

Cai began to experiment with gunpowder in his hometown Quanzhou, and continued exploring its properties while living in Japan from 1986 to 1995. This inquiry eventually led to the development of his signature outdoor explosion events.

Drawing upon Eastern philosophy and contemporary social issues as a conceptual basis, his artworks respond to culture and history and establish an exchange between viewers and the larger universe around them. His explosion art and installations are imbued with a force that transcends the two-dimensional plane to engage with society and nature.