Japanese Tattoo Art

A tattoo is a mark made by inserting pigment into the skin. In Japanese, it has other names such as irezumi or horimono. Tattoos often has a negative meaning in the Japanese society now and it references to yakuza (Japanese mafia).

According to archaeologists, Japanese tattoo has a long history with about 1700 years. The early settlers of Japan use tattoos to decorate their body and then tattoos were used to mark criminals. This action created a new class in the Japanese society including criminals and masterless samurai (ronin). They gathered together under organizations and creates which we called yakuza today.

Japanese tattoos is affected by the art in the Edo period. They are often derived from pictures at that time.

Ryu ni Oni (Dragon and Demon). This was the favourite motif for firemen in Edo

This tattoo was derived from the picture "Moonlight over Mount Yoshino".

This tatto shows one of the favourite actors of the 19th century at Kabuki theatre, Ichikawa Danjuro VII.

Reference:

http://www.artelino.com/articles/gallery-japanese-tattoos.asp

Grafitti

Grafitii is a word which has the origin from Italian. It is a kind of public art which people draw on walls, on vehicles and many public surface. Because of that, in most of cases, it is considered as illegal. Grafitti mainly focus on typography with unsusial and highly decorative fonts. Its contents varies in a wide range from political problems or just a name of the artist.

Grafitii's styles

• A "tag" is a painting of the artist's name using decorative typography. It is also used as the signature of the artist.
• A "throw-up" is a kind of painting which focuses of the drawing speed rather than the visual look of the picture. So, it often uses a little number of colors (3 or 4 colors)
• A "piece" is quite simmilar to a "tag" but it is more complex and need more time to finish.
• "Wildstyle" is the most complex style of grafitti. This style mainly appears on big walls or surfaces. It is the combination of letters, arrows, pictures, etc.

Examples:

Throw-up style's example

Wildstyle style's example

Vietnamese Grafitti

Although grafitti is quite popular in Vietnam, their contents are really poor. There are a lot of grafitto which have text in the format: somebody's name + "love" (text or image) + somebody's name. Artists don't use a lot of colors as well so most of pieces are painted in black and red (it is maybe because spray painters are not common in Vietnam).

This picture is from the Cynical Traveler blog.

This picture is a common type of grafitti although it looks more like advertising. Basicly in Vietnam, there are people who are hired to demolish house, building and other constructions. This is their advertisement which contains their mobile phone number and the text "Khoan Cat Be Tong". They paint their advertisement anywhere they can found. Therefore, their action is consider as illegal.

References:
http://www.compass-marburg.de/imgserver/mixed/galerie/haus/grafitti.jpg

http://www.flickr.com/photos/activefree/78726113/in/set-1685349/

http://www.cynicaltravel.com/vi.htm

http://www.worth1000.com/entries/83000/83422tyBX_w.jpg

Modern Talking

Modern Talking was a German music band with 2 members - Dieter Bohlen and Thomas Anders. Thomas Anders is the lead singer while Dieter Bohlen is singer, song writer and producer.

It became popular from the 1980s with singles "You're My Heart, You're My Soul" and "Cheri, Cheri Lady". This band was very famous in Europe, Asia and South America. Especially, it was also popular in Iran where all other Western music was banned from 1979.

It wasn't so success in the United States as its "Brother Loui" can only rank 34.

In 1987, the band splitted up for the first time. Nearly 10 years later, Dieter Bohlen and Thomas Ander reunited in 1998 and they were immediately success. 2003, Modern Talking decided to disband again.

Modern Talking has a very special style of music which can be arranged as Eurodance. Some characteristics of this style such as the vocals are done by 2 singer, the lyrics about love, dance or emotion. Modern Talking's songs always have sweet melodies which are very memorable and easy to listen.

You can download Modern Talking music at here.

Chinese Comic

Chinese comics (or Manhua 漫画) has a history of more than a hundread year. The following picture is "The Situation in the Far East" from Tse Tsan-Tai who is a Chinese people. Some of them were also used in political purposes such as "The True Record" was used to against the Qing dynasty.

The Situation in the Far East, 1899

In 1928, the first Chinese cartoon magazine was created, the "Shanghai Sketch". After that, many magazines were published in Shanghai to. These magazines runned until 1941, when the Japanese captured Hong Kong, manhua activities were forced to stop. After world war 2, manhua magazines continued and Hong Kong became the biggest market for Chinese comics in the 1950s-1960s.

SeaTiger III, a Chinese comic published in Hong Kong

Look at the Sea Tiger III comic and compare with a British comic (the Beano), we can see that the Chinese comic style was affected by the Western comic style at that time.

The Beano, a British Comic in 1940

In 1970, Chinese comics focused on creating the theme of Kung Fu which the main characters were Chinese heros in the history.

And in from the 80s, many Chinese comics has influenced by the Japanese manga style. An noteable example for this is Bowling King, a Taiwanese comic which used drawing technique, the narrative and comedy scenes from Japanese comics.

The Bowling King