Kanji for Tattoos Links

Ever since I was in highschool I always wanted one of those Kanji tattoos that I see everyone with; there was something about it that just seems cool. Be careful when you get these tattoos though! Most are translated incorrectly. While searching the net for kanji tattoos, I came across an about.com site that had lots of correctly translated kanji so I have posted a link to it as well as some other sites that you may find helpful, enjoy!
http://japanese.about.com/library/bltattoo.htm

General Kanji for Tattoos

Check out your favorite words at "50 Popular Kanji: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10 and Part 11." The sound files are included to help your pronunciation. You can also see the collection of the kanji characters at "Kanji Land".

"Japanese Style" site will help you to create your favorite word in kanji.

"Only One Items For You" site will help you to create your favorite word with Japanese calligraphy font style.

"DSFY (Design for You).com" offer Japanese symbol, your Japanese Name and kanji translation.

"KanjiStyle.com" site is for designers who wish to use Japanese calligraphy or kanji for design materials.

"Kanjiya.jp" site offer unique kanji T-shirts, custom kanji T-shirts with your name, Japanese kanji symbol translation for tattoo.

"Kanjika.com" translates your English words into accurate Japanese characters for the use in tattoo art, logo, designs, your name in Japanese and novel gifts. Also, check out new "Tattoo Checker".

Koreans, Vietnamese Share History and Art

By Cathy Rose A. Garcia
Staff Reporter

Contemporary Korean and Vietnamese art come together in an engaging and fresh mix of history and pop culture, through an exhibition ``transPOP: Korea Vietnam Remix'' at the Arko Art Center.

``transPOP: Korea Vietnam Remix,'' featuring works of 16 artists from Korea, Vietnam and the United States, opens on Dec. 18 and runs through Feb. 28.

The idea for the exhibition exploring the interconnection between Korea and Vietnam was formed while the two U.S.-based curators Min Yong-soon and Viet Le were dining in Koreatown in Los Angeles. Min and Le, who are also artists, realized their common interest in the history and contemporary pop culture of their respective native countries.

```transPop' is an attempt to create a new word, combining transnational and pop. It tries to convey our interest in examining the transnational flow of culture. Hallyu is a very strong force in this transnational flow of culture. … `Korea and Vietnam Remix' is taken from hip-hop, where you mix the music and take some of the elements and create something new,'' Min said, in a meeting with reporters Wednesday.

Min, who was born in Korea but moved to the U.S. in 1960 when she was only seven years old, said the exhibit is part of her on-going quest to learn more about her connection to Korea. ``The exhibition reflects my two areas of interest: history and popular culture. I'm a huge fan and addicted to TV dramas. … And the particular mix of U.S., Korea and Vietnam comes from the background of the Korean involvement in the Vietnam War. The war becomes the historical movement that influences the exhibition,'' she said.

During the Vietnam War, Korea was the second-largest foreign military and economic presence in the country, after the United States. It is also well known that Korea's economy received a big boost from its participation in the Vietnam War. However, the historical and cultural ties between the two countries are not often explored.

Le's own experience as a child when his family escaped from Ho Chi Minh by boat after the Vietnam War, led to his interest in ``historical trauma, pop culture and modernization.''``As an artist, I am interested in what is remembered and what is forgotten. Some of that is represented through pop culture, movies and propaganda. Both Korea and Vietnam have gone through rapid modernization progress. … Modernization can also be traumatic and violent,'' Le said.

Both countries share common experiences in war, and subsequent rapid modernization, Korea in the 1980s and Vietnam in the 1990s. In the 1990s, the presence of many Korean companies in Vietnam led to the influx of Korean dramas, which became widely popular and even influenced the development of Vietnam's own pop culture.

>Tiffany Chung, a Vietnamese-American artist based in Hanoi, will show a video about Vietnamese pop star Lam Truong. ``He is the first Vietnamese pop icon. The video shows him and how Vietnamese are starting to idolize and worship pop stars. This is an influence of the Korean Wave. He does a lot of covers of famous Korean pop songs. This isn't just about him, but also about the new Asian identity,'' Chung said.

During the exhibition, there is a lounge where visitors can read books and other materials on the project, listen to K-pop and V-pop music and watch Korean and Vietnamese videos.

On Jan. 18 and 19, there will be a symposium focusing on ``transnational exchanges and the intersections of history, trauma and popular culture'' and with experts from Korea, Australia, Japan, Vietnam and the U.S.

After Seoul, Min said the exhibit will be shown at the University of California Irvine University Art Gallery in October, and Verba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco in November. While they would love to bring the exhibition to Vietnam, the curators admit it is difficult but are still trying to work it out.

Tickets are 2,000 won for adults and 1,000 won for children and students. Visit www.arko.or.kr or call (02) 760-4598.

cathy@koreatimes.co.kr

http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/art/2007/12/148_15558.html

Unique 'Degas and the Art of Japan' Exhibition in Final Month at Reading Public Museum

READING, Pa., Nov. 26 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The works of Edgar Degas were deeply influenced by Japanese art, yet surprisingly, there has never been an exhibition devoted to this subject...until now. Degas and the Art of Japan at the Reading Public Museum, on display now through Sunday, December 30, 2007, is the first exhibition of its kind to bring together a variety of works by Degas with an illuminating selection of Japanese objects, including a work actually owned by Degas and many images he knew and admired. Displayed side-by-side with the art of the famous Impressionist, these dynamic scenes of Japanese life are revealed as the inspiration for many of Degas' most inventive pictures of dancers, cabaret singers, laundresses and the French countryside.

This unique exhibition of over 60 works, organized by the Reading Public Museum, includes works by Degas borrowed from museums and private collections in the United States, Canada and Europe -- as well as three extraordinary pictures by Degas belonging to the Reading Public Museum's permanent collection. The Degas works are complemented by Japanese objects from major national institutions, as well as from the Museum's own extensive collection.

As the exhibition progresses, Degas' debt to Japanese art comes alive in portraits, pictures of women bathing and combing their hair, scenes of theater-goers and ladies of leisure, and in fans... one decorated by the artist himself. Previously unidentified links between Degas' pictures of laundresses and their Ukiyo-e prototypes are brought to light, as will other little-known aspects of the French artist's sustained engagement with the art of Japan.

The exhibition is accompanied by a fully-illustrated color catalogue written by exhibition curators Jill DeVonyar and Richard Kendall, who also organized the groundbreaking exhibition Degas and the Dance in 2002-3 at the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

This exhibition is underwritten by the Marlin and Ginger Miller Exhibition Endowment and Sovereign Bank. Additional grants have been made by the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, the Jerlyn Foundation, Yuasa Battery, Inc., and the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts.

The Reading Public Museum is located at 500 Museum Road, Reading, PA. Web: http://www.readingpublicmuseum.org/.
READING PUBLIC MUSEUM

http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/news_press_release,229696.shtml