I love it when people get Kanji tattoos. I always think of how much trust it must take to get a tattoo of a word or symbol that someone doesn’t understand. But fact of the matter is that it doesn’t matter so much what the symbol means as much as it looks cool. It is mysterious. So recently, I have been putting random Kanji characters in my paintings of robots. (All of these have been painted by my painting robot, Zanelle.)
Well they Kanji characters are not completely random. I think they mean something, but what they mean is often ridiculous. I am going for an ironic juxtaposition. For example, when people see these, they think the symbols must have something to do with the robot. Perhaps they say something action packed, or perhaps its the name of the robot. But in reality, they say something silly. And because of this, I love the fact that these will be read differently by Japanese and English speakers. English speakers see a cool asian robot with some cool Kanji script. Japanese will see the same retro-robot, but instead of decorative script, they will be able to read the secret message.
I want viewers to figure most of my work out for themselves, but I will reveal the caption on the right. It is a portrait of Jet Jaguar. The Kanji says, “Print Maker Sushi,” or at least I think it does. I can not be sure really. I can’t read Kanji.
Pindar
