Breaking the Surface, Filling the Lungs. Action!

Finally a working version of the Kofuu-Senju Publisher's website is up and running! In the next few weeks more information on various topics will be added, so check back when you have time and inclination to do so.

Work on the first book project, "Kokoro", a portrait of Master Horiyoshi III is progressing nicely.
Me and Horikitsune will return to Japan this spring to continue the collecting of photography and insights that was started last fall.
Besides "Kokoro" we have a number of projects and publications lined up for the years to come, so rest assured that we will be around for some time. Hopefully our work will tell the stories that we see as we look around within our personal universes, and hopefully you'll want to share those glimpses of the floating world with us.

So the New Year begins and as always, there's a tingling of expectations in the Horimatsu gut.
The delayed website for Kofuu-Senju Publications will soon be up and running, and the work on the first book to be published, "kokoro", is going well. Other book projects and ideas are lined up and awaiting progress. I will let you know as soon as the site is up.

2010 will have many hours of tireless work on various Irezumi pieces. Some old clients are approaching completion while new ones are in the stages of planning and discussing.
I expect to be busy as usual, and wish to thank all the committed men and women that present their skin as an offering to Irezumi and becoming it. You have my sincere gratitude and I hope that my work and words can be of use to You.

(the photograph shows clearing summer sky over Kyoto)

Breaking Bread.

Being in the presence of a devoted man like Master Horiyoshi III is food for the soul. Accompanying him to the dinner table makes it twice as rich.

Rickard and Ryu.

A few weeks ago I visited Örnsköldsvik and made this photograph of one of my clients. I had set up a makeshift photostudio in my friend Magnus's hallway using one Elinchrome D-lite 2 flashhead with a large softbox, some black (too wrinkly) fabric and a large handheld reflector.
The sword is a Iato that I bought in Kyoto on my first trip to Japan and the Hakama pants are my first pair of Kendo hakama I got some eight years ago.

I'll give this set up anpther try later on at my proper photostudio at the Horimatsu studios.

Like the little stream
Making its way
Through the mossy crevices
I, too, quietly
Turn clear and transparent.


Ryokan (1758-1831)

Merry Christmas.

A very warm and happy holiday to all readers of Not Tiring.....
Posting will begin anew as christmas fades into a soft and distant memory.


(print by Kawase Hasui)

Few people mastered the art of woodblockprint designing and making the way Kawase Hasui did.
As Christmas, with it's strange tranquillity, approaches, I wanted to show this wonderful print by Hasui depicting Ueno Kiyomizu Temple in snow.