I Whipped This Up The Other Day To Celebrate The Fact That Im Back In The Etsy Game. Check Out My Shop

I whipped this up the other day to celebrate the fact that I’m back in the etsy game. Check out my shop if you’re curious!

New items all this month.

Zachary Trebellas. Summer/Natsu, study. Scanogram. 2015.

This is a study for one of the pieces I have planned focusing on the Japanese habits that have replaced my American ones. With this one I wanted to focus on the Japanese custom of wrapping a damp towel around one’s neck in the summer to keep cool. It is so tricky to get the composition right when scanning yourself, though. I’ve done other shots where I simulate sweat by spritzing the scan bed with water. It works sometimes, but it’s a lot of trial and error. I guess I just have to keep at it. —— This is part of the series I’m working on, Nippo Greco American, exploring my relationship with the three ethnic groups I in some way identify with.

Two more shots from the Silver Lake Dunes.

Zachary Trebellas. 東京の私はどういう人かな (Who would I be in Tokyo?). Text on 35mm photograph. 2015.

One reason I left Japan after two years was I missed communities I’d been a part of in the US, namely the art community and other Quakers. In rural Amakusa there was little art world to speak of beyond the ceramics community, though I did become friends with a few of them. And after four years of regular attendance at Friends meetings in Illinois, I basically gave that all up for two years in Japan.

But in August I discovered that I didn’t have to go home to regain those things, I could just go to Tokyo. I hadn’t been there since age twenty, and I spent a week there before my return flight. In Tokyo I found the things I’d been missing about the US. A friend and I visited a large artist studio complex one day, and I checked out a grass-roots art festival in Yokohama the next. The Sunday before my return, I made my way to the Tokyo Friends Meeting and met Japanese Quakers for the first time. I even came out of the meeting with an interview offer at the Tokyo Friends School. 

Rural Japan always felt like a cultural compromise, but in Tokyo I didn’t have to give so much up. I never imagined I’d live there, but now, I wonder.

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This piece is part of the series I’m working on, Nippo Greco American, exploring my relationship with the three ethnic groups I in some way identify with. 

Zachary Trebellas. Guilty by Association/共謀による刑事罰. Manipulated “Sailor Moon” screen shot and text. 2015. Left text: Shut the #¥&! up! Right text: ¥#$&ing idiot! I’d hoped to put some hand written elements into this piece, but my scanner is not cooperating today, so I had to go all digital.

Zachary Trebellas. Pass/Watasu. Scanogram. 2015.

This is one piece of several pieces I’m working on that focus on the Japanese habits that have replaced my American ones. In Japan it’s expected that you’ll turn an item around so that it faces the other person before passing it to them with two hands. I’ve taken to rotating objects and passing them by hand in the States, though using two hands always seemed like a bit too much. —— This is part of the series I’m working on, Nippo Greco American, exploring my relationship with the three ethnic groups I in some way identify with.