Remember the sneak peaks of the new hot bath, I ♥ Yu, by visionary Japanese artist Ohtake Shinro? Well the bath house has officially opened their spigots. And they have a website, with images that look just as eccentric as the artist himself, to prove it. As I mentioned earlier, They hired graf for the architectural component and botanical artist Makoto Azuma as the landscape designer. And it has shaped up to be one hell of a hot bath!

I’ve devoted quite a few posts (see relateds below) to Naoshima and its surrounding islands. This is because I believe that with the Chichu Art Museum in 2004 and now the recent openings of the Inujima Art Project and the I ♥ Yu hot bath, this region has positioned itself to become the next innovative arts community in Japan. Artists will continue to flock to these islands and we will hopefully see some very unique and interesting work. (They also have a strong corporate backing, which helps.)

Related:

• Shinro Ohtake at the Setouchi Art Festival
• Chichu Museum and the Setouchi Art Festival
• Inujima Art Project
• Chichu Museum and the Setouchi Art Festival
• Hiroshi Sambuichi architect of the Inujima Art Project
  

I have a confession to make. I have never been to the West Coast. Not even once. It’s a region (and perhaps a culture) that I’m not familiar with. But when Jaime Di Dio Aoyama, founder of Studio Aiuto and based in the tiny San Diego coastal town of Leucadia, sent me these pictures I suddenly had a strong urge to plan a visit.

Co-founder and in-house designer Seitaku “Tak” Aoyama was raised in Japan but currently works out of Leucadia, where he overlays his own Japanese perspective with the indigenous culture. For his latest project, Tak designed this surfboard that, in his own words, is a celebration of the fact that “life and death coexist…. When I no longer need my body, I will contribute it to nature with the possibility that animals could use my former ‘home’ as their own. They can have a party in there.”