His Idea of Street Art
Originally uploaded by nofrills.
I'm not going to give a lecture about the Governer of Tokyo, Shintaro Ishihara. All you need to know is 1) He is a right-wing hardliner, 2) He wanted to be an artist (visual art) when he was young (himself being a novelist/author as well as a politician). He used to paint (or draw, I'm not so sure), and one of his sons is an artist (well, sort of). In a word, Ishihara is interested in art. But it seems that in his eyes and mind, there is a clear border between "authorised art" and "un-authorised/anti-authorisation art". Thus, he prohibits "graffitti" while he encourage "street painting" (He's using the words, see the note).
Next to a new museum (the New National Museum of Art, or I should think it's the New National Gallery of Art. The archtecture of the museum/gallery is by the late Kisho Kurokawa, by the way).
Roppongi, Tokyo.
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