A private perspective about a potential future of the Seattle Japanese Garden

By Koichi Kobayashi

The following is a private perspective about a potential future of Japanese Garden, master designed by Juki Iida at the UW Arboretum in the Washington Park, Seattle.

Many Japanese Gardens abroad have been going through considerable change through renovation, expansion and new construction lately. A large number of them have been designed to accommodate ever expansion of art, cultural and other activities mainly associated with gardens.

My proposal as exhibited here for our garden is based on the following assumptions:

1. There is a continuing wish to complete the original master plan with  siting a new  lake view pavilion on the north shoreline.

2. Floor space to accommodate further activities is needed. New set of buildings comparable to expanded section of Portland Japanese Garden could be sited on the east side of the existing parking area with modification.

3. Additional garden with a different style(s) is needed to accommodate expanding visitors. Area east of the cherry orchard could be developed for this.

The following sets of drawing address these assumptions and are exhibiting as my perspective and proposal. [Some of the drawings are included in this post; for the complete set of 27 drawings click here]

This presentation had been discussed with a number of members of Arboretum Foundation, Park Department, Seattle Japanese Garden Society over the last number of years as my and Tom Brooke's private proposal.

Nothing has come out of this and no official approval, just a private proposal.

 Koichi Kobayashi  　

小林　竑一 

Honorary Professor

Eimei University, San Mateo, California

Adjunct Professor

Nagasaki University, Nagasaki, Japan

Principal of Kobayashi Design

Landscape Architecture, Urban and Garden Design

Seattle, WA. USA

BUTOH: Wandering & Wondering: Kubota Garden July 28th, Seattle Japanese Garden August 1st

free site-specific performances & photo exhibitions

encounter performers dispersed in surprising locations
as they engage in a minute-by-minute response to all the
scents, sounds, sights and sensations of the gardens

directed by Joan Laage (Kogut Butoh) 

with music by Gyre

www.seattlebutoh-laage.com

July 28     12-3 pm

Kubota Garden

9817 55th Avenue South Seattle,WA 98118

August 1  3:30-6:30 pm

Seattle Japanese Garden

1075 Lake Washington Blvd E, Seattle, WA 98112

• • • • • 

Photo Exhibitions:

July 1 – August 31

Fresh Flours

6015 Phinney Ave N, Seattle, WA, 98103

Opening: July 5  4-5 pm 

August 1 – September 30

Seattle Japanese Garden

1075 Lake Washington Blvd E, Seattle, WA 98112

Opening: August 1  3:30-6:30 pm

Butoh Training at JCCCW this November

Seattle-based Joan Laage is pleased to be offering Butoh Training at JCCCW. The sessions will be held on Tuesday evenings November 6-December 4 from 7:30-9:30 pm.

Photo: Jim Coleman

The first class is free and following classes $15 each session. No experience necessary. This class series is sponsored by DAIPANbutoh Collective which is a Shunpike partner.
Register by contacting Joan: davidthornbrugh@hotmail.com

Embodying the Spirit: Butoh Training
Taught by Joan Laage (Kogut Butoh)
“The body finds its way…”

Experience training methods towards a supple body/mind and investigate aesthetics common to butoh through creative explorations. This workshop is a process of erasing and re-creating the body through guided improvisation largely inspired by nature imagery. ETS explores endless questions: What is life? What is the human condition? What is the body? How can we experience infinity within the body/mind?

The workshop structure includes exercises and explorations of physical body, nature body, and transforming body.  Group and partner work will facilitate participants’ individual and collective journeys. The workshop draws from Joan’s training with Butoh Masters Kazuo Ohno, Yoko Ashikawa (the major disciple of Butoh’s founder Tatsumi Hijikata) and her background as a Tai Chi practitioner and professional gardener.

After studying with Butoh masters Kazuo Ohno and Yoko Ashikawa in Tokyo in the late 80s and performing with Ashikawa’s group Gnome, Joan Laage settled in Seattle and founded Dappin’ Butoh in 1990. She is a co-founder of DAIPANbutoh Collective, which produces an annual Butoh festival. Joan performed at the New York, Chicago, Portland, Boulder, Seattle, Paris and Santiago (Chile) Butoh festivals, and a Butoh symposium at the University of California (LA). A Ph.D. in Dance & Related Arts from Texas Woman’s University and Certified Movement Analyst, she is featured in Sondra Fraleigh’s books – Dancing into Darkness: Butoh, Zen, and Japan and Butoh: Metamorphic Dance and Global Alchemy. She creates site-specific work for Seattle Japanese gardens annually and tours every winter/spring in Europe. She is an avid Tai Chi practitioner with a background in Asian dance/theater. Since living in Krakow 2004–2006, she has been known as Kogut (rooster). www.seattlebutoh-laage.com; www.daipanbutoh.com

お月見 (otsukimi) • 2018 Moon Viewing Haiku Contest

SJG • 8/25/18 -'Moon', lighting art by Yuri Kinoshita, at the entrance courtyard

Judged by Tanya McDonald and Michael Dylan Welch, Haiku Northwest

Out of 172 entries, we’ve selected the following winners for the 2018 Moon Viewing Haiku Contest, held at the Seattle Japanese Garden on Saturday, 25 August 2018. Many participants wrote about the hazy smoke in the sky from recent forest fires. We chose a mix of poems for their freshness, clarity, and sometimes humor. First prize is an individual garden membership and a garden T-shirt. Second prize a garden T-shirt and garden postcards. And third prize is garden postcards. Congratulations to all the winners for their poems, and to everyone who participated in celebrating the moon even if we couldn’t see it through smoke-hazy skies.

SJG • 8/25/18 - sound installation by Paul Kikuchi throughout the garden in the twilight - a live performance using historic 78rpm record collection and computer. The artist recorded different sounds in the garden and is mixing them with music

First Place

brightly the moon

makes milk of water

drops on a turtle’s shell

                  Tiffany Jenkins

Second Place

smoky air—

my beautiful wife looking at the sky

waiting for the moon

                  Daifu Ye

Third Place

in my inbox

message from the full moon:

—not coming tonight!

                  Aleksandra Monk

 

SJG • 8/25/18 

Honorable Mentions

(in alphabetical order by last name)

my feet hurt

my eyes are tired

oh! the moon!

                  Bill Bridges

even the rabbit pauses

to view the harvest moon

                  Bill Bridges

SJG • 8/25/18 - Three tea ceremonies were held in the Shoseian Teahouse 

round with child

she crosses the garden bridge

waxing August moon

                  Barbie Brooking

shy moon

hides behind clouds

patiently, we wait

                  Bryant Cabanatan

it’s for your safety

ropes obstructing normal paths

under the moonlight

                  CCR Studios

SJG • 8/25/18 - after tea ceremony, attendants launch boats

pink smoke

obscures the moon and more

somewhere trees are burning

                  Elise Fogel

deep sigh—

stop breathing so loudly

I’m trying to think about the moon

                  Kate Griffith

hey moon,

don’t hide from the smoky air

we want to see your beauty

                  Sze Man Li

 

SJG • 8/25/18 - Traditional Japanese Fujima Fujimine dancer

Jeff Bezos' house

& tents of the homeless

under the same full moon

                  Aleksandra Monk

the red moon blooms

I hold your hand

and feel your warmth

                  Corinne Scrivens

a full August moon

my footsteps in the gravel

sound like cicadas

                  Jair Trejo

SJG • 8/25/18 - Haiku on Sticks installation throughout the Garden,
by Haiku Northwest

SJG • 8/25/18 - Haiku contest station:
Judges Tanya McDonald and Michael Dylan Welch, Haiku Northwest

SJG • 8/25/18 - 'Morning Glory / Asagao'  lighting art by Yuri Kinoshita, under the wisteria arbor 

Film Screening—“Black Rain” (1989)—Wednesday, August 29, Noon

We will show our next film on Wednesday, August 29, from noon to 4 in the Tateuchi Community Room. Free and open to Japanese Garden volunteers and their friends (anyone can come and make friends).

Dear friends,


“Black Rain” (running time 125 minutes) is a 1989 American action thriller film directed by Ridley Scott, starring American actors Michael Douglas (Nick), Kate Capshaw (Joyce), Andy García (Charlie), and Japanese actors Ken Takakura (Masahiro Matsumoto), Yusaku Matsuda (Koji Sato), and Tomisaburo Wakayama (Sugai).

The film’s locations are Osaka (Dotonbori, Hankyu Umeda Mall, other Osaka locations); Napa Valley and various Los Angeles locations.

The move’s story is a vehicle for a cops and robbers story with a Japanese setting, which provides cross–cultural disconnections to the fray. Though thin on plot, Ridley Scott overwhelms the screen with a dystopian Osaka, which complements the morally questionable actions of the bad guys and the good guys.

Suspension of belief is mandatory, but our goal is not to carp about implausible situations, but to consider how this American movie presented Japan to American audiences (visually, socially, personally) in the late 1980s…and how that vision has worked out almost three decades later.

The movie was not well received by critics or audiences. See:
https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/black-rain-1989

But over time there has been some reconsideration.  See:
https://3brothersfilm.com/blog/2014/07/thursday-rethink-ridley-scotts-black-rain-forgotten-film-worth-remembering

Notes by Dewey Webster, August 06, 2018

We hope to see you for an interesting viewing experience and terrific discussion.

Your Unit 86 Continuing Education Committee

Trailer below, see you at the film!

SEATTLE INTERNATIONAL BUTOH FESTIVAL: AWAKENINGS: July 5-15, 2018

PRESS RELEASE
SEATTLE INTERNATIONAL BUTOH FESTIVAL: AWAKENINGS
workshops, performances & a special evening with Mushimaru Fujieda
July 5-15, 2018

July 5-15, 2018 - this year's featured guest artist Mushimaru Fujieda, photo by Yukuhiro Toriguchi

DAIPANbutoh Collective is pleased to announce the 9th annual Seattle International Butoh Festival featuring Japanese Butoh artist Mushimaru Fujieda from Yakushima, an enchanting Japanese island known for its wildlife and cedar forests. And its second year partnering with Shoreline Community College.

DAIPAN continues to be the only group consistently bringing national and international butoh artists to Seattle and producing an annual festival that features both guest artists and local performers. From its birth in Japan nearly 60 years ago, Butoh has proven itself a vital and innovative global genre. This multi-faceted festival kicks off with a Butoh Parade and performance/installation in Pioneer Square on July 5 during first Thursday, moving on to workshops and performances in Shoreline, UW district and Greenwood. The second week includes a free family-oriented workshop and site-specific performance on the Elliott Bay waterfront, followed by an evening with Mushimaru at the Japanese Cultural and Community Center of WA, and finishing up with a weekend Butoh retreat in nature.

This year’s festival is made possible in part by funding from 4Culture’s Arts Sustained Support, City of Seattle Office of Arts & Culture’s Neighborhood & Community Arts Program, and The Morgan Fund at Seattle Foundation’s Puget Sound Initiative.

For more information & photos contact:
Joan Laage [davidthornbrugh@hotmail.com] or www.daipanbutoh.com
For workshop information/registration contact: 206-723-2315

Photo by Toshiyuki Shimokawa

FESTIVAL DETAILS: 
July 5 - First Thursday Art Walk Butoh Parade with Mushimaru Fujieda & DAIPAN
plus eco-centric Performance/installation by Ivan Espinosa
5-9 pm
FREE
@Tashiro Kaplan Artist Lofts, 115 Prefontaine Pl S, 98104

July 6 & 7 - Mainstage Performances: Shoreline Community College
Mushimaru & DAIPAN members
8 pm
$15/$22 Brown Paper Tickets; $18/$25 Door
@Shoreline Community College Theater, 16101 Greenwood Ave N, Building 1600,
Shoreline 98133

July 7 - Butoh workshop with Mizu Desierto (PDX)
2-5 pm
$25/$50  BPT https://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/3144252
@ UW Dance Program / 256 Meany Hall, 4000 15th Avenue NE., WA 98195-1150

July 8 - Butoh workshop with Mushimaru Fujieda
12-4 pm
$60
@Taoist Studies Institute, 225 N 70th St, 98103

July 8 – Performance: Taoist Studies Institute
with US guest artists Mizu Desierto (PDX), Crow Nishimura (DAE), & Ginger Krebbs (Chicago)
7 pm
$15
@Taoist Studies Institute, 225 N 70th St, 98103

July 12 - Special free workshop for children & families with Mushimaru
followed by a free performance by DAIPAN & guests
TBA evening
@Myrtle Edwards Park, 3130 Alaskan Way, 98121

July 13 - An evening with Mushimaru: performance with local musician Paul Kikuchi followed by an informal talk
7 pm
Donation
@Japanese Cultural & Community Center of Washington, 1414 S Weller St, 98144

July 14 & 15 - Snohomish intensive weekend workshop retreat with Mushimaru Fujieda
$200 includes food and lodging; early bird discount: $180 by June 14
@Snohomish, WA

 Joan Laage/Kogut Butoh, photo by Katrina Wolfe

Festival passes
THREE-PERFORMANCE PASS: Includes all three ticketed performances (July 6, 7 & 8): $50 (Save $18!)
FULL FESTIVAL PASS: Includes all three ticketed performances PLUS all three workshops (Saturday, Sunday, and weekend retreat): $300 by June 14 (Save $78!)

About our guest artist:
Using movement in relationship to breath and rhythm, Mushimaru has created his own style of dance which he refers to as an expression of Natural Physical Poetry (Tennen Nikutai Shi). Mushimaru’s work symbolically embodies the human tragedy during and after WWII, the “ashes” from which Butoh arose. He has worked as an actor, scriptwriter, producer, writer and director since 1972, and has performed throughout the world for more than 20 years. DAIPAN welcomes Mushimaru to Seattle for the first time. http://www.notus.dti.ne.jp/~mushimal/

DAIPAN artist information:
Lela Besom presents “Death, Cake, and Who You Want To Be,” a work digging into the garden of life and death with Adena Atkins and Kabriele Rosas.
On the spectrum of joyful noise and fearful silence Sheri Brown, Dhyana Garcia, and Alan Sutherland intend to handle it all in “Brave Voices” and come down firmly with our voices, word and dance voices, soul voices. A dream wave channel search and, if the Angels allow, a discovery of an invisible line waiting to be crossed.
In an outdoor pre-show piece, "Home Is Where," Erica Akiko Howard continues a long-term exploration of the confluence of Earth, body, and home—all that we emerge from but can never leave behind.

Joan Laage (Kogut) & Shoko Zama perform “Two Little Pierrots.”  Inspired by the famous Commedia dell’Arte figure known for its naivete, this work premiered in Europe this past spring with Italian dancers. Original music by Scott Adams and costumes by Shoko Zama.

Kaoru Okumura is joined by Aoi Lee in “KAGIROHI 陽炎(かぎろひ),” in which they revisit a piece specially created for the Hijikata Memorial 2018 evening, annually organized by Kaoru.

Helen Thorsen is joined by Erica Akiko Howard, Mary Cutrera and Cara Ross Berman in “The Brittle Sisters: the Bardo of Brú na Bóinne,” which is inspired by a 5000-year-old prehistoric chamber in Ireland and the bones of 16-year-old girl who died lost in a deep Mexican cave looking for water 13,000 years ago.

PHOTO CREDIT:
Mushimaru photo from poster: Yukihiro Toriguchi (photographer)