ジェフリー・フルビマーリコミュのWomen are art

　　　
デイリーヨミウリに記事がでました。
http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/features/arts/20091127TDY14001.htm
どなたか翻訳得意な方いますか。

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'Women are art': Jeffrey Fulvimari on his not-so-secret love of the feminine mystique

Kumi Matsumaru / Daily Yomiuri Staff Writer

As scores of people look on, a man puts on a pair of headphones, takes up a paintbrush and begins painting small circular shapes onto his canvas. The audience watches in silence as the artist--Jeffrey Fulvimari--continues to grow his work, placing large red dots for the lips that will later be outlined in thick black lines.

"I always work spontaneously. I don't know what I'm going to draw [until I start]," Fulvimari told The Daily Yomiuri ahead of the live show.

So where does he get inspiration? The music coming through his headphones? "It just comes out. It's really like riding a bike...It's automatic. I empty my mind as much as I can. It's like Zen."

The soft-spoken illustrator from Akron, Ohio, clearly found inspiration during the live painting show as he entered his own world with a little help from Lady Gaga. He looked content with his completed work, which featured nine women, each with a beauty mark.

After he was finished, an audience member approached the artist. "I'm a great fan of your work; I really want to be a professional illustrator like you," Emiko Shibata said as she handed him a book of her illustrations.

The Jeffrey Fulvimari Super Store in Daikanyama, Tokyo, marks its first anniversary today, in no small part because of his Japanese fan-base, including people such as Shibata. An exhibition of his recent works is also being held until Dec. 28 at Marui One in Shinjuku. On Sunday, Fulvimari will be painting in front of an audience in Hiroshima.

The artist, who has proven quite successful in Japan, said he had known since he was a child that he would one day work in this country.

"My grandmother had really Japanese taste. It was really the flower arranging and the ceramics...there was a Japanese side to it. So, I always had a fascination with Japan," Fulvimari said.

"When I was a student [at the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art], I collected Japanese fashion magazines from the 1950s and made artwork from them," he said, adding there was a huge Japanese influence in terms of aesthetics in the United States in the 1960s, a fact that may explain why the women he draws appear almost Japanese, or at least portray the kind of friendliness Japanese want to see in an illustration.

"What I like about Japan is it is civilized, and there is a high level of aesthetics," he said.

Fulvimari said he tried a lot of different career paths after college, including modeling--he was featured in the Calvin Klein campaign with Kate Moss--but gradually began concentrating on his commericial art after a photographer friend urged him to do so.

Since around 1994, he has been commissioned for illustrations by companies such as Barneys New York and Louis Vuitton.

In 1998, Fulvimari made his Japanese debut after being invited to show his work at Parco Gallery in Shibuya, Tokyo.

His work found a fan base here, in particular through a series of commercials for Ora2 toothpaste in 2004. He also has published books in Japan, including It's O.K. and Everything's Gonna be Alright, a collection of drawings and poetry.

As is clear in his books and illustrations, Fulvimari tends to only draw women. "Women are probably one of the biggest themes in art history, going back to Venus...and the Mona Lisa. I'm not necessarily drawing real physical women. I'm drawing a spirit, which is feminine...I don't believe femininity is frail or weak at all. I think women are really the backbone of civilization."

With contemplative countenances, large eyes and attractive plump lips, his women always appear fashionable and trendy. But Fulvimari said he does not follow trends: "Being raised in a house with two older sisters, I have a natural knack for that [understanding trends]; I don't follow it; I think I have ESP. It's amazing--I draw peacock feathers, and that year peacock feathers will be really big. I don't know where that comes from. I can't cook, but I can do that."

For Madonna's book series The English Roses, Fulvimari again used delicate lines and an array of colors to create a variety of gentle, feminine characters. To finish the books, he had to work "like a maniac"--he illustrated all 13 books in the series, which has been published in more than 40 languages in 100 countries.

Despite their prominent eyes and luscious lips, Fulvimari's women, you may notice, have no noses. He said it is because women can more easily identify with his drawings when they don't have noses.

Currently, Fulvimari is working on a major project with a well-known U.S. jeweler to be unveiled next year.

But he said that he is a cartoonist, not a fashion illustrator. "I think there is always a way to make something enjoyable, not scary or mean-spirited. I love fashion, but not the feeling of coldness it has."

"I admire people like...Charles Schulz," he says. "I want to bring the warmth of Snoopy or Charlie Brown to the fashion world."

A lot of Jeffrey Fulvimari

Until Dec. 28, 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. (until 8:30 p.m. on Sundays and Dec. 23)

Gallery Next Door at Marui One in Shinjuku, Tokyo, a short walk from Shinjuku Station.

Admission is free.

For more information, call (03) 3496-0746 or visit www.jeffreyfulvimari.com.
(Nov. 27, 2009)