Department of Japanese Mathmatics

I was just listening to Neville Brody, the new Head of the Communication Art & Design department at the Royal College of Art, on the podcast speak of all the influences that make up art in a modern society, Speaking of British art being made by so many cultures and influences from so very long ago.

Last week I enjoyed the masters degree art student's graduation exhibition at the National Art University.  It is funny to see, 8th floor,  Oil painting,  4th floor, Nihonga.

Yoda. Nihonga.  Foreign painting. Our Japanese painting.  And the only determinable difference now is that the pigment is stuck to the ground with oil or acrylic on the 8th floor.  On the 4th floor they use hide glue, mostly from the skins of Australian cows.

One of my students further blurred the line last semester when he, being a Nihoga student, starting to mix his "Japanese pigments," (imported from Germany, America, and China) with acrylic rather than with the standard animal glue.  Hey man, that is acrylic paint - 8th floor for you!  He relented and went back to using Australian animal glue as a binder.  Nihonga again.

I say to clear all this confusion the other great Japanese universities should start to separate their disciplines too, Department of foreign mathematics - building 5. Japanese Mathematics - building 7.  And the lot in building 7 still use soroban only.