Yesterday my aunt Shizu, uncle Ron and I went down to the Japanese Canadian National Museum to peruse the archives, and to speak with Beth Carter, the director. The visit was brief but productive: we had the opportunity to see the "special room" that the sound installation will be housed in, and we began looking through some of the items that are going to serve as inspiration for our contribution to the Kizuna exhibit: mostly photographs and Hanafuda playing cards (such beautiful cards!), but this will expand when I have a chance to have a proper sit-down with the archives next week.
Equally important were two longer sessions today, one with composer Yota Kobayashi, in which the details of the sound installation were more firmly fleshed out. Immediately following this was another get-together with my aunt and uncle: we went through old photo albums that belonged to my grandfather. Grandpa was an avid (if eccentric) photographer, and much of our recent family history has been well-documented thanks to this passion of his. Interestingly, towards the end of his life Grandpa reorganized his photos (of which there are literally thousands) into a seemingly random order (which I'm sure made perfect sense to him), so these albums no longer have any discernible chronological flow. Enter my aunt, whose formidable understanding of the Hayashi family tree could decipher any of my grandfather's anachronisms.
Some of the photos were incredibly old -- at least one (pictured above, of my great, great grandfather and mother) dates from the end of the 19th century. But my mission was to find pictures that spoke of the Seasons: these photos will compliment Yota Kobayashi's sound installation: a new, "Japanese" Four Seasons (see my previous post for a more eloquent explanation). I believe in this regard, we're off to a most promising start: photos abound of season-specific events, such as Christmas and Halloween, but also of more traditional festivals, like Koinobori (Carp Streamer Day), Hinamatsuri (Girls Day), and Shogatsu (Japanese New Years).
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