Spring impressions

Just sending everybody some nice Spring greetings.

In these days I have been busy mushroom hunting and herb picking.

We all enjoy Spring so much over here... Instead of talking I would like

to let the photos speak today...

 

 

Autumn at Kuju

Don't know why, but I wanted to paint an Autumn pick today. This is one of the beautiful waterfalls at Kuju mountains. I want to go there again next Autumn...

Done with acrylics, watercolor on paper. Size is 35x44cm

Original available

Fotos from the exhibition

The past days have been overwhelming !!! I had so much fun at the exhibition and with everybody and time literally flew. Tomorrow I have a lot of appointments, so I decided to update my blog today.

Here you see the newly restored "Tokyo metropolitan museum" in Ueno park. It was closed for almost 3 years due to restoration and just opened this April again. The complex ist HUGE and you can easily get lost. There are so many exhibitions there and Ueno park is simply beautiful.

Here you see our exhibition space there...

and this photos give you some idea about the many different styles and paintings in the show. It's always so refreshing to see so many types of art hanging together in harmony there.

These are the works of the German artists form "Wallauer Fachwerk"

And here and on the photo below you see the works of the artists, I introduced to "Salon Blanc" because of the show in Makurazaki in 2011. BUT I could have never done this all alone... my wonderful friends Hayashi Toshiko and Riyo Satou did most of the work and organizing, so THANK YOU two for everything !!! Thank you for making this possible for all of us !!!

It was kind of funny this time... my painting was hanging right between the French and German entries, but since my name is Japanese, it made everybody wonder ^^

Here some photos of Uneo park during Hanami season...

Thanks to everybody for the wonderful time !!!! Hope to see all of you next year again !!!

Exhibition in Tokyo April 1-6 2012

Today, the 16st international exhibition of "Salon Blanc" in the "Tokyo metropolitan museum of art" is finally open. I will fly to Toyo tomorrow to meet all my friends and fellow artists there.

I'm already looking forward to see the show and of course I will take many photos.

Here, you see my entry. This time I used many different materials like feathers, wood, sand, clay, acrylics and airbrush. Size is 70cm x 1m. Original available. 

Morels ^___^

Magnolias are coming...

...plum-blossom is fading...

...so this IS the right time for morels (morchella deliciosa) now...

Morchella deliciosa (ashiboso amigasatake) is the earliest one, followed by Morchella Conica, which will come out next week, I think.

We had so much fun on our first morel-hunt this year... looks like this will be a busy weekend.

Spring is here...

after some days of cold, grey weather, Spring is finally here.

This is a photo of our latest hike at Ukitake (浮岳).

and here are the beautiful plum-blossoms near our appartement...

that mushroom is called "Erdstern" in German (earthstar) and it's everywhere here now. It always grows before morel-season, so it tells me, I have to wait one more week with my morel hunt eventually. 

But we can already pick Fukinoto (フキノト) here... those are the flowers of the japanese butter-burr. They taste bitter, but very pleasant.

They are a little bit more difficult to find here, than in Hakodate, because they need cold climate, but if you drive a little bit into the mountains, you can find a lot of them.

I made them as Tenpura, together with paprika and shiitake :)

Cherry Blossom 14

Like every Winter, I get in the mood to paint some cherry blossom pics. This one I finished today while I visited my painting group in Nishijin.

It's done with acrylics, pen and airbrush on paper.

Size is 35x18 cm

Original available...

Last days of Winter

That's how it looked like last weekend.

We had some snowfall, which is really unusual down here in the south... green trees, palm trees and snow looks quite strange...

...but I loved the camelia blossom with the snow.

I took some photos and maybe I'm painting them someday like this.

The snow is gone already again and in the next days we expect mild weather and the beginning of Spring.

Oh, and here is a recent photo of Muu, who is totally crazy about our ladder. They both have the same colors ^_^

Walking at Iwarayama

At the weekend, we drove up to Iwarayama (井原山). We hoped to find some Fukinoto there, but it looks like it will still take 1-2weeks to grow. The kids enjoyed to play in the snow though...

...and in the bright sun down here in the south, it already feels like Spring.

No luck with Fukinoto, but we spotted some "real" Enoki エノキタケ. The Enoki you can buy in the store over here are white with a long stem, but when they grow in nature, they have a rather brown color.

They mostly grow in Winterseason. That's why they are called Winterrübling in German. Their latin name is "Flammulina velutipes".

We had them with Miso-soup ^_^

Castle ruins

Being not very active here, does not mean I did not paint much. In fact, I was working very hard on my huge painting for Tokyo and on a commission. April is going to be exciting and I'm looking forward to the show in Tokyo.

In the last days I had finally some time left to do a new painting... just very spontaneously. It's a part of the ruins of the "Stadtpark Wilhelmsbad" in Hanau.

Painted with acrylics, pen, watercolor and airbrush on paper.

Size is 33x24 cm

Original available. 

Oyster mushrooms

Saturday we mostly go to Onsen and later try out some of the restaurants in downtown Fukuoka. This time we went to Kirin Beer-pub in Tenjin. The potatoe-salad is one of the specialities and it's made with self-smoked ham.

We also had delicious ham-pizza with rosemary oil...

...carbonara-pasta and famous Kirin "Brau Meister" beer.

and on top of that a beautiful view on the shirne and city illumination...

...but on that day, we also found a BIG surprise... mushroom-finds always happen, when you expect them less, but you need the heart to go out and have a look. We took a detour to the Onsen and suddenly found an old tree with MASSES of Oyster Mushrooms (Pleurotus ostreatus) ヒラタケ.

You can buy them in shops, of course, but from nature they really taste best !!!

My mom invented a delicious and easy recipe how to cook them. It's the same I use for Blewits (lepista nuda) ムラサキシメジ.

You need some chicken-parts like chicken wings... glass-noodles and the mushrooms. Make a broth out of the chicken and flavour it with some broth-spice powder (consome powder). Then take out the chicken-parts (you can grill them crispy later in the oven) and put in the sliced mushrooms. Boil the soup again and add the noodles in the end...

Here is the result on my plate... best fits a good dry white wine with it. Bon appetit ^_^

Happy new year 2012

Since we came back to Japan, I have been very busy... overcoming our jet-lag, laundry, e-mail and snail mail (got 25 letters waiting...) and reading though all the beautiful X-mas and new-years cards.

There is one thing, we were eager to eat: Jinanbo-Ramen !!!!

The store is located near Muu's pet hotel and so we ate these Thai-style Ramen before we picked him up. They taste very different from "regular" Ramen but they are very deliciously flavoured with Coconut-milk and other spices.

The next day we went to Ukitake-shrine to greet the new year.

That shrine is over 700 years old and has a lot of ancient paintings and sacred rocks...

In the evening we took a lovely walk through Tenjin, had some great food at the Hakata Harp and at a cozy restaurant, called "Gaza". Actually, I wanted to take some more pictures, but we were mostly in the mood chatting and laughing, so I totally forgot. Well, I will do so next time ^_^

Today, on our trip to Shikanoshima we were totally surprised to see the very first Cherry-blossom this year. It was the only one and the tree is located at an Onsen (hot-spa) and since Shikanoshima is the warmest place in Fukuoka, it might be the reason, why it already came out.

Now I really look forward to Hanami-season... even if it will take about 10-12 more weeks.

But first I will be busy working on my new big painting for the upcoming show in Tokyo and on some other pieces. Also need to catch up with my mail... >_>