PORTUGAL  Arte e Poesia  em Nagasaki　

 Typhoon was approaching in Nagasaki on 6th, covered the sky grey with thick twirlig clouds. It was my first visit Kyushu. The colour of the city seemed to symbolize her past and history. 　

 After checking in hotel, I went to the Art Museum of Nagasaki, where I met Shoji Yasuda, president of Japan Portugal Association in Nagasaki, as well as the organizer of the following exhibition "Arte e Poesia em Nagasaki." The show will open from 2nd to 14th October. It is an extending tour exhibition by Arte e Poesie at GYRE in Omotesando in May. This is one of the commemorating events for the 150 anniversary of modern diplomacy between Portual and Japan in 2010.

 During our two days meetings, I fixed schedules of tile workshop, opening on 1st October,  and also the shipping arrangement of my prints and tiles.

 The museum was designed by Kengo Kuma, one of the most leading architects in Japan. The structure bridges over a canal, and the view reaches down to the port of Nagasaki. 

 As it locates at the head of the wharf, down from Dejima quarter in a minute walk, seemingly it navigates to the frontier of the new perspective of art.

 In the afternoon of the next day, the typhoon past to the north, and my first sort of tourist site was a commemoration of the Martyrdom of the Twenty Six Saints. It locates at Nishizaka park, near Nagasaki Railway station. A large panel, mounted the bronze statues of Saints, including twenty Japanese christians wth two children crucified in 1597, was built in 1962. Bronze sculptures were made by Yasutake Hunakoshi in the same year. 

 For its historical background, visit a related web-site like;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-Six_Martyrs_Museum_and_Monument

 I took a photograph of the sky, which each Saint looks up, and lept a mind to the sky of the day, of  their last day's. The scene also reminded me a book cover of,  my version of, "Chin-moku - The silence" written by Shusaku Endo in 1966. It was also a photo of the dark sky.

 Nagasaki citizen doesn't take a bicycle for commuting either transporting method. Because the city locates on steep hills. After all it doesn't annoy walkers, very often it scares pedestrians that bikes ring at our backs. Enjoy walking on streets in Nagasaki. It was great.

 

 

 

Visit more works on SHIRASSTUDIO HP.