九尾 Kokonobi 迎え火の神様 Mukaebi no kamisama (Gods of the Welcome Fire) 真夏の午後の日差しを前に手も足も出せず、辟易としつつ悪態を付いてダレている迎え火の神様とそのお供達。お勤めは夕方からなので暑いのは……。 というかんじで「お盆」です。 詳しいことは分からないけど、「お盆といえばコレだよね」というくらいに、誰でも知っている割り箸付きの胡瓜と茄子。駅前のブロンズ像を破壊して自慢げに語る、あからさまにガラのワルそうな男の子であっても、踏んだり蹴ったりせずに普通に避けてしまうあたり、この脚付き胡瓜&茄子はタダ者ではないのでしよラ。 それから子供の仕草でしばしば見られる「突然何もない所を凝視して、しかも目線が何かを追っている（2人同時だったりすると、さらに破壊力UP)」、あるいは似たようなジャンルで、「何もないトコに向かっていきなリ全力で吠える犬」なんていうのもあリますが、今回はこの2つを材料に「日本の四季」を描いてみました。 大人には見えない「何か」があるのでは？ ああいった場面に遭遇するとそんな妄想が膨らみます。 In the afternoon of a midsummer’s day, the god of the welcome fire and his attendant are so hot that they cannot move, they are sick of the heat and cursing. They do not start work until the evening so this heat... That is the general setting for this picture of ‘Festival of the Dead’. Even people who know nothing about the custom, all recognize the cucumber and eggplants with four wooden legs made from chopsticks as being symbolic of this festival. Even the boy who boasts of having broken the bronze statue in front of the station and who is obviously a delinquent will not stamp on or kick these, he recognizes that there is something different about them that stops him. If we look at children we see that sometimes they ‘suddenly start staring at something that cannot be seen, their eyes following it’ (the effect of this is even more powerful when two children do it simultaneously). Another similar phenomenon can be seen when dog will suddenly barks at something in a certain direction which is appears deserted. In this work I have combined these two elements to portray summer. Is there ‘something’ that cannot be seen by grownups? When you come across this kind of situation, it expands your imagination.