2014 National Kokeshi Festival part 3 2014 全国こけし祭り 3

Each year the National Kokeshi Festival in Naruko is held in the town's grade-school auditorium. It's a good location for many reasons, but significantly because the playing field is used as a large parking lot. We had arrived pretty early and readily found a spot, but by the time we returned from the kokeshi shrine (see previous post) it was already packed with cars! Furthermore, the line to get inside was the biggest that I've ever seen, and Naoko heard that there were even a few people who had been camping out in line for three days to ensure that they got in first. Yes, kokeshis are definitely popular these days.

The line in front of us.

The line in back of us. Sheesh.

The doors finally opened everyone patiently worked their way inside the school. As always we had to go through a temporary gate that turned the entrance area into something special.

The 60th anniversary commemorative tenugui 手拭 (hand cloth).

The lobby area where one could by a program, posters, post cards, tenugui, and t-shirts which were of course popular with the few Americans in the crowd.

Ah, here are the t-shirts! Naoko bought one for me.

These large hanging kokeshis, reminiscent of the hanging decorations used in the in Sendai Tanabata Festival, greeted everyone as they entered the main event area.

The organized mob of kokeshi lovers. I think everyone was having a great time.

One of the guest kokeshi craftsmen was Mr. Susumago Morizo 煤孫森造さん from Hanamaki 花巻 in Iwate Prefecture 岩手県.

Here's Naoko catching up with Mr. Susumago whom we visited at his workshop earlier in the year.

One of our favorite kokeshi makers Mr. Hiraga Teruyuki 平賀輝幸さん from  Sakunami Onsen 作並温泉.  His cute kokeshis were obviously very popular with the attendees.

Success!

Here's Mr. Abe Shin'ya 阿部進矢さん, whom we just visited at Atsumi Onsen 温海温泉 in Yamagata Prefecture 山形県. His work is incredibly popular and he reportedly sold all of his kokeshis in about 25 minutes. I believe that, as later on I saw a TV news story and one lady had probably 15-20 of his pieces in her shopping basket. No wonder he sold out so quickly. 

After Mr. Abe sold out his kokeshis he had plenty of time to chat with his fans.

Lots of kokeshis for sale.

Testament to the current popularity of kokeshis were the many TV news crews and photographers roaming around the hall.

Mr. Takahashi Yuji 高橋雄司さん from Akita Prefecture 秋田 was also one of the guest kokeshi makers.

A selection of Mr. Takahashi's kokeshis.

It really was packed the first day.

Mr. Kakizaki Fumio 柿崎文雄さん from Fukushima Prefecture 福島県. He makes the coveted Tako-bozu たこ坊主style of Tsuchiyu kokeshis 土湯系こけし.

Waiting in line to make a purchase.

This is Mr. Suzuki Sei'ichi 鈴木征一さん from Yamagata. He makes the rare Hijiori kokeshis 肘折系こけし.

There was lots to see and do besides visiting the kokeshi makers, and there were some also kokeshi-related items to buy.

Truly beautiful kokeshi art on linen for sale. We got one of these a few years ago.

Kokeshi art on cotton cloth (tenugui). There were eighteen different types available.

Kokeshis done by local school kids.

The make-your-own kokeshi painting area.

This is the event poster from the 8th National Kokeshi Festival, which I think I showed in my blog a couple years ago. Wonderful graphic design, and I would love to get a reproduction of this. It says on the poster that the festival used to be held on 1 October instead of early September. I wonder why the date was pushed back by a month?

This year there was a lecture area, and seated is kokeshi scholar Mr. Takahashi Goro 高橋五郎さん who was going to be speaking later in the day. Unfortunately we weren't able to listen to his or any of the other lectures.

Beyond all of this excitement, there were also hundreds of award-winning kokeshis on display for everyone to view and take pictures of. I'll show some more of them in an upcoming blog, but here's a small sample of what we saw

So that was the first couple of hours of the festival's kokeshi viewing and purchasing venue. At this point we decided to take our friends who had joined us to see a bit more of the Naruko area, including the Japan Kokeshi Museum. I'll show that visit and more of the festival in the next few blogs. 

2014 National Kokeshi Festival part 2 2014 全国こけし祭り 2

Fairly early Saturday morning we got up early and headed from our inn back up to Naruko Onsen for another ceremony at the Naruko Onsen Kokeshi Shrine to be held one hour before the festival venue opened. On the way we stopped briefly at the local bakery across from the city hall where I noticed three different event posters hanging in the window. Very nice.

In contrast to the previous night's ceremony that was about bidding farewell to old, unwanted kokeshis, this ceremony was a dedication ceremony to welcome new kokeshis. When we arrived people were already milling around, with the kokeshi makers and invited guests going inside the shine for the actual ceremony. Oddly enough, until this point I didn't know that people could actually go into a Shinto shrine.

Back at the Kokeshi Shrine.

As we were waiting for the ceremony to finish I noticed that there were two kokeshi-related stone monuments on the shrine grounds. The smaller of the two simply said "Kokeshi Song Monument," while the larger one might be loosely translated as "Even though Michinoku is far away, like a dream, a heart's mountains, a heart's kokeshi." 

The small monument.

And the large monument.

This banner hanging on the front of the shrine says "National Kokeshi Festival Dedication Ceremony."

After the ceremony ended a few of us went inside the shrine to take a look, and in the back room of the shrine was a display area with about 55 kokeshis on a tiered display unit. I presume they had been given a Shinto blessing.

Meanwhile, at the end of the ceremony everyone involved gathered for a group photo to mark the occasion.

Oh yes, one more thing. During the ceremony I was wandering around the grounds and looked into the shrine shop where I found its traffic-safety prayer sticker for sale. As can be seen in the photo, it has a very nice kokeshi theme and is one of the coolest things I got during this adventure. This will definitely be going on our car!

The Traffic-Safety Prayer sticker.

It was now about 9:30 and the ceremony was over. At 10 AM the doors for the main festival venue would be open like Willie Wonka's chocolate factory for the lucky children, so we walked over to the school where the event was being held and got in line. More on that in the next blog entry.

Sato Kokeshis in Tama City 多摩市の佐藤こけし

Yesterday Naoko drove to Tama City 多摩市 in western Tokyo to see kokeshi maker Mr. Sato Yasuhiro 佐藤康広さん from Sendai City. We met Mr. Sato a couple of years ago at a traditional crafts show up in Sendai, and also visited his father Mr. Sato Masahiro 佐藤正廣さん at their riverside workshop. The Satos are of the Togatta kokeshi school 遠刈田系こけし, and their work is exquisite as you'll see in the photos below. Naoko chatted with Mr. Sato for about 30 minutes and found out that he had done a show in Ueno in downtown Tokyo before this one, and it was very successful. Naoko also reported that there weren't a lot of people while she was at the venue, but I'm sure things picked up later in the day. If you're in the Tokyo area and would like to visit Mr. Sato, he is doing this show as part of a traditional Japanese crafts event 日本工芸職人展 at the Tama Keio Department Store in Seiseki-Sakuragaoka 聖蹟桜ヶ丘、京王百貨店. The show will continue through 17 September, though I'm not sure if Mr. Sato brought enough kokeshis for all those days!
Here are some of Naoko's photos of what she saw.

Naturally Naoko purchased a couple of kokeshis, including a tiny ejiko kokeshi えじここけし which represents a baby in a basket. That method of child care was a tradition among Japanese farmers in the old days, and kept alive today through the art of kokeshi makers. She also got to see Mr. Sato do some work on the portable lathe he brought with him.

Here is Naoko's new ejiko kokeshi.

Mr. Sato brought a small lathe with him for doing demonstrations.

Mr. Sato prefers to sign his kokeshis with ink from an ink stone -- pretty cool.

Signing Naoko's new ejiko kokeshi.

As we can see Naoko had a very nice kokeshi adventure right in her own back yard! Ah yes, of special interest are the two kokeshis below. These were for display purposes only, as Mr. Sato did them by request for another venue. What's unique is that they are painted with indigo, Japan's traditional blue dye. Apparently it's not an easy material to work with, so I don't think we're going to see too many indigo kokeshis out there, but they certainly are handsome.