手彫りはその性質からボカシにムラが出やすいものだが、彫桃氏はそれを克服せんと技術の研鑽を続けている。その傾向が特に顕著となる薄ボカシにおいても、氏の作品では極めて滑らかな仕上がりとなっているのが見て取れる。
もちろん針目の荒々しさこそが手彫りの良さであるとする意見もあるだろう。しかし修練を重ねた末のひとつの到達点として、氏の技は特筆に価する。
Due to the nature of hand poking, it is easy for bokashi (shading) to be uneven, but Horimomo continues to improve his technique to overcome this problem. Even in the case of usu-bokashi (light shading) where this tendency is particularly pronounced, we can see that his work has an extremely smooth finish.
Of course, some may argue that the roughness of the needle marks is the beauty of hand poking. However his technique is worthy of special mention, as it is the culmination of practice for a few decades.
数多くの絵画や彫刻に表され凡そ定まったイメージが形成されている龍だが、その姿形の起源は中国後漢の時代にまで遡る。身体の各部位が様々な動物に似ているとし、その特徴を“九似”と言う。曰く「角は鹿、耳は牛、頭はラクダ、目は兎、鱗は鯉、爪は鷹、掌は虎、腹は蜃、うなじは蛇」とされている。
もっとも時の流れの中で次第に変化し、今日我々が思い描く姿が上記の限りでないことは言うまでもない。
The origin of the dragon figure, which has been represented in many paintings and sculptures and has formed an almost fixed image, dates back to the time of the Later Han dynasty of China. Each part of the body was said to resemble various animals, “The horns are a deer, the ears are a cow, the head is a camel, the eyes are a rabbit, the scales are a carp, the claws are a hawk, the palms are a tiger, the belly is a shin (imaginary creature), and nape is a snake.”
However it goes without saying that the image has gradually changed with the passage of time and what we envision today is not like the above.
