Worcester Art Museum - Samurai! Opens Friday

The commonality of the hands on sword of Zatoichi and Mari Inukai (painted by Kent Williams)

The exhibition concept began last year, somewhere before the furious cold his the East Coast. In short, the idea was to let the original Japanese armory speak to contemporary artists and see what happens. There was a lot of thinking and dreaming of the possibilities, and of course it gets distilled into what's best for the space and the audience, but perhaps one day, this exhibition will go "full dream."

Curating from afar isn't the easiest way to get things done, but from the photographs, the exhibition looks tremendous. I'll be seeing it quite soon. (Worcester Art Museum)

The list of artists:

Miya Ando, 
Esao Andrews, 
Shawn Cheng, 
Josh Cochran, 
Moira Hahn
, Jed Henry
, James Jean
, kozyndan, Mu Pan, 
Ferris Plock, 
Stan Sakai, 
Masakatsu Sashie, 
Rob Sato, 
Yuko Shimizu, 
Katsuya Terada, and 
Kent Williams

It's all about the feet. Again, the handling of swords by Katsuya Terada in background and Yuko Shimizu in front.

The Schedule of Events on Friday. Sponsored by my old friends at Intertrend. 

A great combination. The magical suit of armor that's actually "single sourced" and kozyndan's Uprisings which was using on the cover of Giant Robot 28. It lives yet again. (Most suits of armor have pieces collected from different suits.)

Yuko Shimizu and arrows - a can't miss combination. Don't forget Mu Pan's piece on the right. 

Moira Hahn's piece lended itself perfect with the logo of the exhibition. It's now the banner on the museum. If I were Moira Hahn, I'd say "holy shit!"

An installation view featuring Rob Sato, Yuko Shimizu, and James Jean. (It turns out Yuko and James were classmates at SVA in NYC)

Masakatsu Sashie

Mu Pan

Rob Sato

Shawn Cheng