Publisher: Schiffer Publishing
Authors: Takahiro Kitamura Katie M. Kitamura
List Price: $29.95
Amazon Price: $29.95
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Reviews:
Summary: fabulous photos, unique access, lost opportunities
It appears to be the sad fate of English-language books on the Japanese tattoo that they so rarely combine all the desired publishing strengths--first-rate photography, unique insights, disciplined writing, and careful documentation--in a single volume. And this is disappointingly the case with Takahiro Kitamura's "Bushido: Legacies of the Japanese Tattoo." The book includes, as previous reviewers have noted, stunningly beautiful photographs, and it benefits mightily from the personal access of Kitamura (who tattoos as the artist Horitaka) to modern practitioners of the Japanese tattoo. However, it is also the case that only a minute percentage of the book's illustrations are captioned and explained, the text keeps shifting perspective and voice, and the glossaries and index are inadequate.
As Kitamura has proved in both "Bushido" and his "Tattoos of the Floating World," the Japanese tattoo deserves to be regarded as a serious art form. It also deserves to be presented to the public by mainline art publishers who employ the best designers and the best color separation technology. To achieve this, the time has come for talented and passionate specialists like Kitamura to consider teaming with professional art writers who flourish outside the confines of the tightly-knit tattoo community.
Summary: Excellent book
Best tattoo book I've ever seen. Large, colorful pictures, detailed descriptions, and beautiful artwork. I had to drive all the way to Japantown in San Francisco to find the book because it's out of print or something, but it was worth the wait. Pick this up, you won't be disappointed...
Summary: BUSHIDO: the Japanese tattoo legacy worth looking for
I never thougth I would find a book that got me more excited about traditional Japanese tattooing than Sandi Fellman's oversize Polaroids collected in THE JAPANESE TATTOO. However, BUSHIDO has changed all that, and I am overly excited once again. This volume is a showcase of modern Japanese tattoo artist Horiyoshi III, as recorded and written by client and student Takahiro Kitamura. Kitamura is able to describe the unique position that tattooing occupies, somewhere between traditional and modern techniques, as well as balancing between Japanese and Western stylings, and ancient and post-modern belief systems underlying it all.
The photography is by Katie Kitamura, wife of the author. Her pictures are reproduced mostly in full-color plates, focusing on the overall aesthetic along with lots of the details. The models are both men and women, of varying ages and stages of coverage. Full portraits are complimented with more closely cropped photos, enlarging complexly-patterned details, subtle shading and expressive faces. A lexicon of body areas with the traditional Japanese names for the style of body coverage along with names for the styles of fill and background is a unique highlight.
A rare and difficult find, worth every effort it takes to get this one into your tattoo book collection.
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