NOBUNAGA BIRTHDAY PROJECT ⓷ Kyoto 前編

Still celebrating Nobunaga's Birthday and training with traditional artworks!

I apologize if this picture is not so different from the previous one, but I wanted to focus on Nobunaga's expression and mood, this time.
On November 1968, Nobunaga marched on Kyoto to instaurate the shogunate of Yoshiaki Ashigaka after the betrayal of the Miyoshi & Co. When people compare Nobunaga to Cao Cao, probably this event is what came to their mind first: the military authority settled "a puppet" and governed in their stead. I'm not sure this was the intention of Nobunaga, but I believe he was quite aware of what this act meant. Nobunaga was in 34 in this period. I was quite aware of my place in the world when I was 34 too, I realized that I had no way to make my wishes come true, unless I started to fight for them. "Fighting" meant "work hard, work harder" and on the opposite of Nobunaga, I could give it up and survive in some other way. Nobunaga didn't have this choice. He wished for a peaceful land to live a better life, to allow his subordinates to live a better life.

NOBUNAGA BIRTHDAY PROJECT ⓶ Okehazama

Going on with my tribute to Nobunaga Birthday event! Every week, from May 12 to June 23, I'll produce an original artwork dedicated to our favourite demon lord!

For this second picture of this serie, I decided to go with Okehazama, an event that in my opinion marked the "Lost of Innocence" of nobunaga, that for the first time had to face a huge external threat. It's a legendary battle that evokes all kind of feelins and imageries, event contraddictions and contrasts of interpretations... A carefully planned attack? A matter of good luck? Was it all about the skills of the lord, the ability of his armies, the mastery of the locals--?
It's a battle that it's still surrounded by mystery and doubts, and it's still a source of clatter in the community.

Personally, I decided to draw Okehazama mostly because of the current rainy weather... Apparently it was raining in the eve of the battle, too. "Battaglia bagnata, battaglia fortunata", maybe--?

Another movie featuring Nobunaga-- "Kubi" by Takeshi Kitano!

--I got to know about Nobunaga movies always by accident! This time it's about Kubi (首,"Neck"), based on a novel by Beat Takeshi. Feels like a controversial movie that could be just presented as a premiere at Cannes rather than partecipating the festival... The story circles around the betrayal of Araki Murashige, and follows Shinzaemon and the farmer Shigesuke in a spiral of events that would lead to the Honniji Incident.

NOBUNAGA BIRTHDAY PROJECT ⓵ Younger Days

Today it's May 12, a day that marks "one" of Nobunaga's birthdays.
Past year, I took my time to celebrate it through some articles dedicated to the character, this year I want to try the "artistic route". I'm getting quite rusty with my traditional art skillz, so I'm trying to sketch something with watercolours and coloured pencils to keep myself "trained" :) I decided to paint some Nobunaga's portraits, then, trying to capture the character during the years or in certain media depictions-- This year challenge is drawing a new Nobu every week, then!

Let's start with a Nobu from his younger days! A popular period of his life when it comes to fans preferences and the funniest to draw for sure! Nobunaga eating persimmons (yummy!) is one of my favourite themes, this is probably my second portrait of him doing so-- This time I tried a more "realistic" approach, though... Sorry if this is quite rough, but I really felt like experimenting a bit with the medium here--

Looking at him, he looks more like a monkey Hideyoshi rather than a Nobu 😅

One, No One-- Definitely more than Three?! A peek to the "Three Nobunagas" pamphlet!

--I realize how foolish it is to talk about movies that I didn't watch, but by now you are aware that I like to collect such items, as these various depictions of Nobunaga amuse me despite my actual experience about them, which is, in most cases, for obvious reasons, impossible!
Today's piece is quite significative in this sense, as I want to browse with you one of my last acquisitions, the pamphlet of the Three Nobunagas (3人の信長, Sannin no Nobunaga) movie, released in 2019. This looks like a fun comedy that plays on the exact issue of historiography: that nobody really knows "who" a historical figure "really" is, despite their importance or significance in history.