Featured Dialogue:
Brought to life through connection

Après-guerre Reissue Vol.4
February 2017

Photos by Koki Matsunaga

ties can make special things
「the relationship between the perceiving and the perceived」

ISSAY (Der Zibet、KA.F.KA、ISSAY meets DOLLY)
✕
Toru Nogawa (Artist)

If you’re a fan of ISSAY, it’s highly likely that you’ve seen Toru Nogawa’s art with him featured as a model in them. Those pieces are not meant to be portraits of ISSAY, but rather of someone else. Someone who isn’t iSSAY. What was the process that led to the creation of these works? This dialogue session will follow the collaboration between the artist and the model.

―― Were you acquainted before you asked him to model for your art?

Toru Nogawa (N): I’ve known him as an artist since my teens, being a fan of Der Zibet.

ISSAY (I): And then, we got to know each other through a mutual acquaintance.

N: And then, when we were drinking at an afterparty in a live house after a show, I decided to shoot my shot and speak to him about modelling (wry smile). Because his style and vibe were just perfect for the theme I was going to paint with.

―― Come to think of it, has ISSAY-san ever been an art model before?

I: No, probably not. I don’t think so.

―― I would think that there were many opportunities for you to be in photoshoots, but how did the conversation about being an art model go?

I: I was very interested because he’s someone who is capable of painting absolutely fantastical art. In the case of photos, whatever’s in the environment you’re taking photos at will also show up in the photo, right? But that doesn’t necessarily happen in a painting, and I thought that would be fun to look forward to, so I was more than willing to be a part of it.

―― Does Nogawa-san have a theme in mind before looking for a model who fits it?

N: That is indeed how I create. I think it’ll be easier to consider this from the perspective of a theatre play. [The character] I asked of ISSAY-san back then was Siegfried, a protagonist from Richard Wagner’s opera, Der Ring des Nibelungen. It’s as good as me casting ISSAY-san in the role of this character. Another theme I had in mind at the time was Dracula. A vampire. A vampire aristocrat known as the Count from the era of black-and-white film.

He in the paintings who is not ISSAY

―― What’s your process when you’re creating the actual piece?

N: The standard procedure would involve the model posing in front of the artist, but ISSAY-san is of course a busy person which means that it would be difficult to do it this way. So he prepared the outfit, took photos for me in a studio and I drew based on what I received.

―― Did you discuss poses for specific scenarios?

N: I picture them in my head, so I think it’s similar to how one would stage a play. Whether it’s Siegfried or the vampire, I’m painting them based on the same person, ISSAY-san, so he has to become someone else entirely in the painting. His response to my requests was tremendously potential-filled. He really turned into a whole other person. It only really hit me later just how amazing a performing artist I asked to do this for me.

―― Do you imagine yourself as this character, or rather, embodying it?

I: I go into it with a simple posture. Like, since this is the type of scenario it is, this is the posture that would fit. Meaning it’s better if I position this leg a little further in front, for example. To compliment that, my left leg will end up like this, but would it be better if my legs were closer together? That’s the kind of thought process that goes into creating a detailed posture.

―― I suppose your pantomime experience comes in handy here.

I: Indeed. Pantomime may have been most helpful.

―― What were your thoughts about being cast as Siegfried and a vampire?

I: I hope it’ll be alright (dry laugh). And, since I was selected by the artist, I suppose there’s a good chance it’ll be fine. I think it doesn’t matter how he perceives it, as long as he’s able to bring it out through me.

N: I wrote an abnormally long email for our very first discussion (lol). What I pictured only existed in my mind and I wanted to share that with ISSAY-san, so I think I set the scene for him by writing something like a short story. For my Siegfried (※From W.R.Wagner’s Ring des Nibelungen) piece, he doesn’t actually have a sword on his person but I requested that he posed in a way that suggested he was holding one. It’s pretty much a pantomime. And at the time, I also wrote an essay with details like the general length of the sword the character was supposed to hold, and descriptions of this locale that only I have a vision of, like how there’s a Greek architecture-inspired column in the back. From the second request on, ISSAY-san had kindly grasped my tendencies in my art, so I didn’t have to be as detailed anymore.

I: Since then, if I asked, “How’s this?”, for example, he’d just say, “More like this,” or something of the like.

N: I’ve been requesting images from ISSAY-san for a lot of my work in recent years. So doing it this way is better (lol).

―― How did you feel when you first laid eyes on the artwork that was created through such a process?

I: It’s difficult to put into words, but in a nutshell, like, “Whooa…”. “So this is how it turned out.” While there’s no doubt that I’m present in his world too, I couldn’t have ever imagined the extent of its depiction. Because my world is more indistinct. And this has taken shape as something beyond the world I imagined. What made me happy was seeing how [the character in the piece] was obviously me, but it wasn’t me. I was really happy about that.  He painted here what he saw through me.

―― I believe people who know ISSAY-san will be able to tell that he’s the model but this isn’t a painting of ISSAY-san, right?

N: If I were to do a portrait painting, I’ll probably have to paint ISSAY-san as he is. On the contrary, what I hoped to do was see how much of ISSAY-san’s inherent personality I could carve off.

―― So since then, you’ve been making paintings of different themes and settings.

N: To me, The Picture of D (Dの肖像 / D no Shouzou) is a mystery to be solved but I told ISSAY-san that it’s based on The Picture of Dorian Gray. Dorian Gray’s first initial is D, just as Dracula’s first initial is also D. In addition, something visitors to my exhibitions mentioned to me was that Der Zibet also starts with D. They commented the three D’s were brought together in this piece, so it’s a painting that I’m also very happy with. It’s a double-image piece of Dorian Gray along with a particular sort of immorality that is drawn from vampires, right? From this point, we can increasingly say that [the subject] isn’t entirely Dracula and what I painted is a marquis of darkness, an immortal undead king of ISSAY-san’s and my making. Dracula has a variety of appearances but he’s described as a member of the aristocratic class of marquis in mainstream European stories so this series actually leans closer to the original. From then on, I started to leave the details to him.

―― How did ISSAY-san carry out your part of the work?

I: Take, for example, this pose. I’ll move my body while thinking about factors like, to what extent can I exhibit an air of reclusiveness, or whether this character really considers themself to be alone, or what this person might think if another were in their presence, and things like that.

N: Since then, ISSAY-san would move and adjust his poses while I kept clicking the camera shutter. I feel that doing this gives the piece more depth than before. There’s an interesting element that comes from the lack of a specific target here. Through this method, that which is naturally unique to ISSAY-san would be incredibly apparent in the final piece. But that’s not the ISSAY-san we personally know. It’s the ISSAY-san who becomes the gaze of the character in the piece. Which puts us in a similar position as the audience who watch ISSAY-san when he performs on stage. That’s why I can look at the art more objectively. And that’s a good thing. The method I use is a classic technique of the old masters, so the painter has to remain calm too. Instead of wielding the brush in a subjective state of mind, I have to paint with a somewhat analytical perspective, as if I’m critiquing a painting done by another. That’s why it’s very good if I can look at a painting objectively.

Turning Der Zibet’s song into a painting

―― And after that, the theme that you chose to work on was Der Zibet’s song.

N: As a painter, when I watch their concerts or listen to their albums, as long as text or words or music are present, pictures will come to mind. So I mentioned that something like this came to mind and asked if it was okay for me to paint it since it was based on a Der Zibet song.

I: And I said, please go ahead (smiles). I appreciate it.

―― So you wanted to create an artwork of an image that came to mind from a song.

N: Of course, it’s not exactly the same as the lyrical world ISSAY-san writes about. Instead of tracing an artist’s work from the perspective of a third party experiencing it, what I feel I’m doing is closer to traversing the path carved out by their work and weaving yet another story out of the leaves and branches that I come across. 

―― What’s it like having a song by your own band turned into a painting?

I: It’s a strange feeling. But it makes me really happy, though. Like, ahh, so this is how it turned out. I have my own idea of what it might look like, right? When it’s released from Der Zibet’s control and turned into something that comes from Nogawa-san, it’s really refreshing for me to see what a great piece he’s made of it. I was very happy.

N: I didn’t notice at the time, but I just realised something. Thinking about it again, it’s a strange order of events for me to ask if you’d be willing to model and feature in this painting even though you’re singing in Der Zibet to begin with.

I: That work was actually done during our concert, right?

N: Ah, right.

I: Without me singing (dry laugh). It was really interesting though, wasn’t it? To me, I think the person in SISTER ROMANOID is kind of bubbly, somewhat crazy. This was brought with subtlety so I liked that. And it’s clearly got something that leans towards romanticism, doesn’t it? I love that a lot.

N: This isn’t an illustration, to begin with, but a world that I believe only the people present at a concert and people listening to this song possess. And [this painting] is just one of those [worlds].

I: Meaning that it just so happened that Nogawa-san opened this door, y’know?

N: It’s something like a parallel world, see? Following that, I’ll paint with a more confined essence from the lyrics. The most recent piece was Gekka Bijin which features the marquis of darkness. I overlapped the characters from Ein Dunkler Markgraf with Der Zibet’s Gekka Bijin.

―― In other words, you’ve arrived where your two worlds converge.

I: It’s like some kind of reaction occurred.

―― Will you continue to count on ISSAY-san as a model for your paintings going forward?

N: I’m thinking of starting a Der Ring des Nibelungen series alongside the marquis of darkness in 2017. I’ll also be holding an exhibition in November at a private gallery in Paris which is owned by the chairwoman of French automotive company Peugeot. Seeing a painting with ISSAY-san in a gallery located in a European cityscape is certainly fitting, isn’t it? That’s what foreigners will see.

―― It sounds like you’ll be creating many more pieces in the future.

N: Right now, I’m just listening to all the Der Zibet CDs I have (lol).

■ISSAY PROFILE
Vocalist in Der Zibet, KA.F.KA, ISSAY meets DOLLY. With an unparalleled presence unrivalled by any other artist, his charisma draws an impressive following. He has upcoming live events on February 19 at Kichijoji ROCK JOINT GB and on March 25 at Shibuya GLAD performing as Der Zibet.

■INFORMATION
OFFICIAL HP: http://derzibet.com/

■Nogawa Toru PROFILE
An artist who creates unique fantastical worlds with oil painting. A member of the International Fantastic Art Association (IFAA) and Fondation Taylor, Paris, France. His works have been exhibited in shows at locations like Ginza’s SPAN ART GALLERY. Planned activities this year include a two-person exhibition at SPAN ART GALLERY in autumn, an exhibition in Paris in November, and other vampire-themed group exhibitions.

■INFORMATION
OFFICIAL BLOG: http://blogs.yahoo.co.jp/eden_gallery
OFFICIAL Twitter: https://twitter.com/ToruNogawa

Translation: Yoshiyuki
Scans: Yoshiyuki
Image of Ein Dunkler Markgraf：魔性の刻 : Toru Nogawa @ Official Blog, Twitter

Feature: What are your favourite things?

Après-guerre Reissue Vol.1
December 2015

Der Zibet celebrates its 30th anniversary this year. As the vocalist of the band, ISSAY’s presence is inimitable. With this issue’s theme surrounding our interviewees’ “favourite things”, we take a deep dive into his mind and catch a glimpse of a surprising side of him through conversation.

Der Zibet、KA.F.KA、ISSAY meets DOLLY

ISSAY

PROFILE
Active with Der Zibet,  KA.F.KA, ISSAY meets DOLLY among a wide variety of activities, ISSAY’s is ultimately a vocalist with an unwavering character whose presence radiates through his performances which incorporate pantomime and, of course, his singing.

INFORMATION 
ISSAY OFFICIAL H.P.: 
http://homepage2.nifty.com/issay/

Der Zibet OFFICIAL H.P.:
http://derzibet.com/

New album, Bessekai

―― Releasing an album this year, in the year of your 30th anniversary, did you take any special notice of things like milestones or turning points during production?

ISSAY (I): I think I’d be lying if I said no, but it’s not as if we paid all that much attention to it either. It was sometime around the end of last year when the band had drinks together while talking about the concept of the album. After that, we only decided on the album’s name after the start of this year. First came the concept, then came the name. And only afterwards did we start to put the music together.

―― Does it mean that everyone has the common idea of another world that isn’t the one we live in?

I: To start, when we were discussing the concept, we decided that we won’t do anything that would get classified as indie, or too niche, or anything like that. Der Zibet has always been a band that is said to be “too niche” to begin with anyway, but we’ve released a few albums since our reunion, and we’re of course satisfied with them, but we feel that we’ve producing them in a friendly manner. And thought, isn’t it about time that we made something that featured our quirks in the limelight? Those were the sentiments that came first. Once we had that down, we started thinking about what exactly were Der Zibet’s quirks, and things like MONDE MOVIE and MONDE FILM and MONDE MUSIC started coming to mind. Which led us to wondering, what’s the definition of MONDE in the first place? Cutting to the chase, it’s something like another world (bessekai / 別世界). As we started talking about how it seems to imply something that isn’t of this world but rather of another, we started to get the idea that Bessekai might be a good idea for an album title.

―― Hearing that gives me the impression that you’re only talking about going back to being “too niche” because this is for your 30th anniversary.

I: I don’t think the other band members feel this way, but for me, personally, I see our situation as a band from 1985, who made the type of music we did back then, thinking about what we want to create in the year 2015. Obviously, 30 years have passed, times have changed and even we have changed in our ways of working and all that, so all things considered, what are we going to do in 2015? What are we going to do now with the same underlying feelings that we had when we first started the band? That’s what I personally kept thinking about.

―― Apart from going in the niche or indie direction, does [this album] have any other tangible differences from your other recent works?

I: Rather than some strong, pointed intention to bring things towards this direction, we simply freed ourselves from our shackles. [Normally,] if I think that something might be difficult to grasp, I’d make small changes to it, right? So that’s something I decided to stop doing this time around. Even when we have [jam] sessions among ourselves as a band, we’d usually try our best to eliminate the thinking that certain parts of our music should be made more easily acceptable. No matter how niche we are, or how much people say we’re indie or whatever, we’re a band who’s attuned to pop, so no matter what, I think our melodies are pop-ish. That’s why we felt that it’s not possible for us to do anything ridiculously outlandish.

―― I also have the impression that as a band, Der Zibet is pop, but this album-

I: Is easy listening? (Lol)

―― -was somehow overwhelming to me from the second track onwards, when METRO was followed by Mr.Bad Trip and then Toki no Boumeisha (時の亡命者).

I: Because that’s the kind of flow we intended with the track order. If we wanted [the album] to sound like pop, we wouldn’t do this (dry laugh).

―― That’s true. So how do you feel about the work resulting from freeing yourself of the shackles of making yourselves easy to understand?

I: There’s quite a big difference when it comes to the lyrics. How do I explain this simply. Say, for example, there’s a second character in the lyrics. In previous albums, I think this second character would be given form and made visible. I’d write “you” and write it all down so the listener would know what kind of person this second character is. But this time, we completely ignored all of that. And we additionally also did our best to refrain from writing typical love songs. Love songs are easy to make sense of. Very easy. That’s what we wanted to rid ourselves of as much as possible. We just want to make the world we envision even more blatantly visible the way it is, you know? And, you can see it, can’t you? You just can’t help it (lol).

―― Because you show us the worlds that could be seen and felt with each song just as they are.

I: Exactly. That’s what it is in a nutshell. That’s why you can no longer describe it with the words ‘pop music’, right? But from each and every one of the songs, you can probably see different worlds in them. I think you’ll be able to see them clearly. But I don’t think there’s anything more to it than simply giving us a view of the worlds that the protagonist steps into. That’s the kind of work it is.

―― Going back to what you initially said about the concept, does this mean that MONDE MOVIE is one of the keys to this album?

I: No, not particularly. It’s just that when we were discussing Bessekai’s concept, the music that HIKARU presented was an instrumental piece. I thought it might be interesting to put lyrics to it, so I did that without anyone asking. That also happened to be the moment in time when I was trying to figure out what kind of lyrics I should write, so this ended up being the very first set of lyrics that I wrote for this album. And once this was done, I was easily able to compose the lyrics to the rest of the songs. For me, there’s this tunnel when I’m writing lyrics and if I don’t go through it, I won’t be able to write. The tunnel this time around wasn’t all that long, but I wrote the very first set of lyrics which were for MONDE MOVIE, without any thought at all and after that, it got easier and easier for me to write. It’s not that I want to do it all in this manner, but I just think it was a really good thing that this was how it started.

―― How did the recording go?

I: Smoothly. I used a hand mic to record my singing this time. I mentioned that there’s one mic that I really favour because I really like how it I sound recorded when I sing into it, and HIKARU said okay, sure. Then, let’s record with you singing into the the mic in your hand. It’s just so comfortable to sing with a hand mic, you know? The last time I sang into a hand mic was when we recorded our second album (dry laugh). Isn’t it nice to not have to worry about how and where you’re standing?

―― It’s the kind of album that makes me think of entering a world while you’re standing still and singing though.

I: Because there’s no song to sing unless I immerse myself in that world.

―― Not that. I was thinking of a more physical sort of world.

I: Like darkening the room?　Personally, I generally do keep it darkened but not so much recently, I think. Because I want to make it relaxing, you know? If it’s set up ahead of time, I think it’ll just turn into something that makes my stomach hurt more. Anyway, I just didn’t want to be bothered by unnecessary things any more. I wanted to lose the tension in my shoulders. Does that make it easier to understand? Besides, don’t we use hand mics for live performances too anyway?

―― I just can’t imagine what kind of a live performance this album will yield. Although, I’d expect that there’s some form of live show unique to this album.

I: Well, it isn’t exactly an album with much leeway, is it?

―― Now that the album is complete and you’ve released it, do you think it’s turned out to be what you had imagined when you initially decided on the concept?

I: What we thought of in the beginning was in no way defined. It was something more ambiguous. That’s why it’d be wrong of me to say that we’ve created exactly what we envisioned. We are satisfied with how we executed it; the way it’s turned out with the kind of album name and concept it has. It’s a very experimental album for us from that perspective.

―― So you’re satisfied with the results of your experiment. What do you like about this fulfilling work of yours?

I: I guess I’m satisfied with the fact that it’s got quite a hefty presence as an album. I’m not talking about how it’d turn out in a live performance, but just the way it is as an album. I’m happy with it.

Going home

―― When you talk about going home, you’re referring to returning to your actual hometown where you grew up, right?

I: Literally what it generally means. I go back a few times a year. Although that includes occasions when I go back because I need to attend to something on this day and that day, regardless of my personal intentions.

―― Do you feel more relaxed or liberated when you go back?

I: I don’t. I think when I was about 27 or 28, before then, it felt like the city was telling me ‘Welcome home’ every time I got off the train and stood in the station. But after a certain point, it stopped saying that. It was then when I realised, “Ah, I don’t belong to this city anymore.”

―― What do you do when you go home?

I: I check.

―― Check what?

I: My own pain, for example. It’s a city where a river flows. When I go there, I can check on the pain that I felt from back then. Whatever the time, whether midnight or midday, I’d go to the beach and zone out while staring at the sea, and check on my past self who used to watch the sea like this too. I check and make sure that the person I was back then is still in this body of mine.

―― Is that because you want to stay the way you are?

I: Yeah.

―― I’m getting the impression that this is connected to your being a performer.

I: There’s no doubt that it is related. I need to drop by home, make my rounds and visit each key spot, and check how this sea looks to me at this point in time.

Rose garden

―― Do you like rose gardens?

I: I’ll go once or twice a year. Usually, I’d visit one in Tokyo.

―― I’m definitely very much into the idea of ISSAY-san with roses, but why rose gardens?

I: It’s fun, for some reason (smiles). It feels like I’m on a leisure trip. But I haven’t been able to see the spring or autumn roses. But when I was in Kamakura for business the other day, I went to the Kamakura Museum of Literature and there happened to be a rose garden there so I took photos (smiles).

―― Do roses mean something special to ISSAY-san?

I: That never crossed my mind. But don’t they make you feel, like “whoa” when they’re in full bloom? It makes me feel as if le spectre de la rose from that ballet might be in there somewhere. Like they inspire dreamy fantasies. Although, the same goes for cherry blossoms too. Because I feel a thrill in my blood when I go to places where cherry blossoms are blooming all over, you know? It’s embedded in Japanese DNA. I go cherry blossom viewing too.

―― You’re surprisingly fond of taking leisure trips.

I: I love them. I just don’t think of taking them often. I actually like man-made places and sights. Like places where buildings are all lined up together. I feel like the city is breathing when I see the buildings’ rooftop lights shine and flicker. I love it.

―― And in all of that, you just happen to adore roses.

I: Yes. I’d go and look at the sea. I adore roses. And cherry blossoms. Those are the kinds of things I love.

Translation: Yoshiyuki
Images: Yoshiyuki