On April 12, 2024, I visited the graphic arts department of Tokyo University of Arts, where I was to take part in a meeting with prof. Seiichro Miida and his students in the graphics studio.
Seiichiro Miida welcomed me warmly. I remembered his gentle and subtle personality.
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During the meeting, students presented a graphic portfolio titled: Monsters' Eyes. It contained graphics made in various techniques inspired by the iconography of japanese monsters, especially Godzilla. The two-part hairy portfolio contained graphics whose structural element was a hole used to bind the book together. Below are selected graphics from this series.
Then we started looking at the sketchbooks that Seiichiro Miida had brought together. There were plenty of them. I am a big fan of his drawings and thanks to this presentation I could see his sketch works again. His drawings in sketchbooks have a special quality - peace, perseverance, meditative fantasy. In paralel I presented my much less organized drawing notes that I made during my trip to Echizen and Kyoto. Our conversations about sketchbooks quickly turned into interactive drawings on sheets of paper with students. Below are some photos of the works created during this session.
At my request, Seiichiro Miida also presented manuscript drawings made on the margins of Samuel Beckett's texts. The works reveal an interesting author's process in which drawing ideas are created live in parallel (next to) the text, which is, to some extent, a mysterious spectator of their materialization. The presented manuscripts were later the basis for more technically complex works made using intaglio printing (etching, drypoint). Thank you very much for this presentation, it was a privilege and very inspiring experience.
Thank you prof. Seiichiro Miida and students for an extremely interesting meeting. I'm very glad that we could draw together. We need somehow to develop this project in the future.
Bzzzzt (sharpener)
