you can tell that the guy making the bonsai scissors really loves his work and his art. the fact that he’s also letting his sons choose whether or not they want to pursue in his craft was heartwarming but also bittersweet.. 22 generations thats craxy

bro Ghassan is such an absolute chad. To rediscover a process from ancient historic texts is nothing short of remarkable. We need more of this dude.

To me craftmanship means I pay once for an item to last me a lifetime versus buying multiple cheaper versions every few years. It really means paying upfront. It also means respecting the item and the value that was imbued into it.

I was NOT expecting the tyrian purple guy to sound like that omg

as much as I love the craftsmanship in the artisan calligraphy brushes, having practiced calligraphy for a decade with a master calligrapher whose family are all masters, they all say the same thing... the quality of the brush is far less important than the hand that uses it. if you are disciplined enough, you can write beautifully with the frayed part of a snapped chopstick

For those of you who don't know, Daizo Kaneko has a line of calligraphy pens and brushes! He's like the Japanese bob ross tbh

I felt sad for the lack of health and safety protection for the workers, even if they are self employed. Look at al the soot on the faces and no doubt the carbon in the lungs.

A family of blacksmiths spanning 22 generations?!?!? Holly hell! That is so amazing, I hope he's able to preserve his family's business. His tools are definitely works of art themselves, and they create art as well. What a rich cultural background. I wish I had more culture in my upbringing. I don't even know what my Grandfather's names were.

My ancestors used to make calligraphy ink, and I can still remember the wooden molds. But these molds were all thrown away 35 years ago. My family migrated from Southern Anhui, China, where the most famous calligraphy ink originated, and was produced.

The development of modern pigments and large-scale paint manufacturing helped make the art and craft of oil painting affordable to almost anyone. It's always interesting to cite the luxurious, lapis-derived Ultramarine, the exotic and macabre Mummy Brown, and the sad (and thankfully obsolete) Indian Yellow, but the current palette is largely made up of highly affordable, synthetic organic pigments developed after the 19th c. These often out-perform historical colors in terms of permanence, tint strength (the potency of a color in mixtures) and covering power. Synthetic pigments also make it possible for a huge variety of artist's colors to be safe enough for anyone to use with no special concern for safety, unlike some historical colors which would not be considered safe today by most standards. We think the Old Masters would marvel at the low cost, high quality and broad availability of paint available to artists today!

I am a traditional Chinese lacquer artist.Studied 26 years in China.The artist explanation is perfect.Japan makes the most pristine lacquer in the world.I believe Tang Ming Xi has visited this artist. The one problem is the fact natural lacquer is related to poison ivy and artists today are not Will to sacrifice the time to make apiece.Thank you for this video.

People making paint out of pollution made me cry, I literally cried, I am so touched that some people out there still do what they're passionate about and also love to save their planet. That's such a wonderful noble cause. As an artist myself, I think that is one of the ways we can show our love to others, to humanity, that we care about the future. Thanks for that.

Amazing. The amount of work and time to make sumi ink is inspiring on its own. The ink is art.

The lifelong dedication to their craft is so amazing and admirable. This is a wonderful documentary.

I guess in conclusion: • Materials • Labor • Rarity • Length of time in making it • Who is or are making it • History • Demand • Quality • Brand

Man, Ghassan could spread this technique as an influencer and also give workshops and turn his workshop into a museum- this way more people will get to know about him and the lost ancient tradition and support his amazing art!!

In Mexico they have a similar snail that gives purple dye, but they milk the gland without killing the snail.

I am impressed and amazed anytime an artisan shares their process to bring understanding to their work. I appreciate the craftsmanship that takes time and pride in quality. I can only imagine the extinction of some processes that we lost over time.

Mr. Hata said he started making that brush when he was 50 and he's now 70 years old! Dude looks like he hasn't aged! 🙌🏽💯

Most people don't appreciate how expensive art is to produce.

Someone once said that the most important factor in the value of an artwork is its noticeability; it doesn't matter the reason for which it is noticed. That person was the creator of the font Comic Sans, and that's why he considers it a success (despite many people absolutely despising it).

Sumi-e ink is one of those heritage crafts that, if the market truly demanded it, could readily be scaled through the use of automation. However, the artists and calligraphers who use the ink value the craftsmanship behind the inks that they use as much as the ink itself. So even if you could use industrial processes to produce an identical product, that isn't really what they want for their pieces. Maybe they would use those ink sticks to practice with, but for the calligraphy or paintings that they intent to pass on or sell, they would want something with more heritage and tradition behind it. Having used a few different grades of brushes while painting, I can 100% understand the demand for high quality brushes. Particularly if you work in washes and tints. Working with thicker media like undiluted oil paints and acrylics, you can readily make due with lower quality synthetic brushes that have the right spring force and shape, but if you use thin paints like watercolor and gouache, or thinned out washes of acrylic or oil paint, then the way a higher quality brush loads and dispenses this thinner paint is priceless to you.

1:13:45 I can well understand why many people feel reluctant to contemporary art. The abstract portraits in particular lack recognizable craftsmanship. Accordingly, the majority of the value does not arise from the "artwork" and its creation, but from speculation in the art market, because it is not at all about "art", but about investments coupled with the desire for increase in value over time.That actually has nothing to do with what most people understand as art and its inherent search for beauty, and accordingly the general rejection by most people is understandable.

I admire Japanese how they can still manage to hold on traditional work and put great effort for it.

I'm so happy, that some of my iron oxide paints are recycled from this muck, so it's helping to clean up the environment! I love Iron Violet

"we have to be very careful about over harvesting" ... "I used 800lbs of snails to dye this scarf and im not finished yet"

Something that is so crazy and hard to comprehend is just how much time and how many trials and errors went into perfecting every single thing on this planet basically

I love seeing century-old, or even millenia-old, crafts kept alive, and seeing people appreciate their craft and the items they create. The items made carry so much history behind them; all the knowledge and creativity, the sourcing of the raw materials, the trail and error, and the people behind them. Hundreds or thousands of years of mankind's invention!

It was really cool to see the actual women who have made a handful of my brushes. 😀 I appreciate that. The section on oil paint was a bit BS'itty, considering the mentioned pigments. Tyrian purple has never been used in oil paint. It's way too substandard and fugitive. Tyrian Purple is, as was said previously, a collector's item. It has no practical use, as it's inferior to all other purple colorants in every way. 'Purple Lake' was historically a purple variant made from Cochineal insects, not snails. Today it's usually a Quinacridone. They also never ran out of Mummies. (there were plenty of them, in Egypt they even used mummies as fuel for the steam engines of a railway). They ran out of social acceptance, as society emerged from the gritty medieval ages (people were quite upset, at least one artist held funeral services for Mummy paint). And Mummy was also fugitive and thus unsuitable for permanent work. Cobalt Blue is not expensive because of the process temperature. Synthetic Ultramarine is in the furnace for 18-20 hours and is fairly cheap. Cobalt Blue is expensive because Cobalt is expensive and toxic, and the pigment's properties (extreme permanence) are little sought after outside the art material market. Thus it's not mass produced, which makes it even more expensive. Production volume is a major reason for cost of pigments. Even pigments which were difficult to develop and are extremely difficult to synthetize, eventually come down in price, if there is a sizeable market asking for them, thus driving mass production processes. The car, ceramic tiles and sign industries' demands for durable colors, is what has driven the emergence of fairly affordable modern fast pigments. Iron Oxide/Hydroxide pigments are the most important colored pigments in the world. They are also the most important Art pigments. They are in many ways the very best pigments there are. Synthetic Iron Oxide pigments can be a bit disappointing for artist use, but on the other hand we are running out of good natural deposits. Mining sludge from old mines, for pigment, seem like a brilliant idea. I was really happy to see this. The last section, on modern art, blah. 🤨

Im Tunisian and this is the first time i heard of Ghassen and his insane dedication 😭

😱WOW... I DEFINITELY was NOT expecting that voice @ 23:13 but TBH... it was a nice lil' unexpected surprise!! LOL🤪

“Art is anything you can get away with.” -Andy Warhol.

I've always wanted to explore the cultures around the world that are less recognized than what are usually commercialized. Lacquer painting really is an intricate form of art and I got to know about the Tyrian purple dye only now. Thank you for the video!

And yet people ask artist to sell artworks for free😑

Art has always been expensive. That's why historically artists have noble patrons to pat for it. The higher quality equipment one require, the more expensive it is.

Those poor guys in the soot room covered in black oil soot with no mask and no shoes should receive both and I’m sure a raise too. That’s what we call externalized cost

It’s beautiful to see the value of quality exceed quantity and monetary success. You can tell these people take pride in their work above all else

I live in the Piedmont region of the USA……the “foot of the mountain “. Our soils contain high concentrations of iron oxides, eroded and oxidized ancient mountains, of which the Appalachians are the remnants. I harvested everything I could get my hands on to make various colors of paint……the resulting paintings made a show I called, “Dirty Pictures”. Fun! Quite crude compared to the Gamblin suppliers’ pigments. I’m going to order some of those right away!

I really hope those guys that make the ink are generously payd for this job.

Anyone saying Tax fraud doesn't understand the majority of art... As a artist and a wife with a bachelor of fine arts. almost 90% of all art is not tax write offs and most artists struggle and their mediums are very expensive. support artists!

Can we get the British and Japanese brush and ink makers together and just kinda see what happens?

As an artist, what bothers me about pieces that look like they were just slopped together is that there are people out there who put months into their work, use multiple skills to make massive pieces of mixed media art and get absolutely zero for them, despite only charging a miniscule portion of the millions the other pieces go for, and have people just telling them their work isn't worth that much. I've personally sold a few pieces maxing out around $50 and I'm genuinely worried about posting a piece I am going to charge $500 for for exactly that reason, despite my over 25 years of experience, multiple different types of classes and courses as well as continued practice with the help of teachers and university taught artists on KZfaq, the use of multiple types of media and it being genuinely aesthetically pleasing on an objective level. I'm not saying I'm amazing at art but it is pretty and there are years of knowledge and experience behind it and still I feel like I would be cheating people out of money even thought in the art world $500 is really not all that much.

That acid mine water is what the Mayan's used to soften granite rock so their walls would fit together so exactly. There's an interesting video by Ancient Architects about it.

@41:15 so we're just going to ignore the fact that the only thing he had to say about the practice of using crushed up human remains as pigment was that it was perfect for some flesh tones?

Fully convinced Japan is really good at overcomplicating and over perfecting things

I did NOT expect the Tyrian guy to sound like that.

Nice to see fine hand crafted items carefully made to last in an age where low quality and high quantity items are everywhere.

I have some kolinsky sable brushes. They were indeed expensive, but my teachers explained they were essential to get the best watercolouring possible :)

Fantastic collection of artisan stories!

I can listen to the narrator's voice all day long. Watching an interesting topic at the same time is just a bonus. JAJAJA

love the craftspeople in this, especially the snail guy!

I feel bad for the animals involved in these processes.

It just goes to show you- quality is never achieved with mass production- but rather with human skill and passion and patience.

When it comes to quality, as you go up in quality, price increases intensely for small changes. There is a uniqueness too when something is made via traditional, human spirited technique , not just admirable for the difficulty of it, but because to a highly knowledgeable and experienced artist or collector can both see and appreciate these nuances that a typical person would overlook, or perhaps see but not understand what makes an ink, or an art peice have a powerful spirit and beauty to them. I dont think this belittles modern inks or paints or artistic products that have created a fast and cheap "good enough" replacement , these are equally amazing discoveries , and sadly as the world constantly evolves, we lose some of these ancient industries , just as certain species go extinct, so too do our materials needed to recreate a moment in art history. I hope all these master craftsmen can continue their work as long as they are able. Its a lotus among so much murk and darkness that our world struggles through

So he makes 6000 ink sticks a month and sells one for at least 1000$? I'm starting to think that I'm in the wrong business. 😆

With all other examples you can see people loving their craft with passion... with modern art you can see a bunch of pretenders trying to defend the reason for their scam; no soul, no finesse, no function, only pretenses.

Its the artist's effort that makes it special. The blood, sweat, and tears give meaning to art

Interesting contrast of the craftsman clips with the abstract painting clip. While abstraction art is interesting it’s arguably easiest to con people with an abstract painting vs. the years of dedication needed to be a blacksmith, inkmaker, etc. I still really enjoy thought provoking abstract art…I just don’t know if it’s worth millions.

This is mesmerizing to watch. No wonder they are remarkably expensive.

Absolutely stunning mastery of their arts. The price of the end result is the cost of the creators life who perfected the excellence. Let us celebrate the masters 🙌👌

If I were the snail and my gland was getting cut right off while Im still alive, I'd turn purple too 😱

Money laundering makes art expensive

Grt❣️Thank you for creating this lovely vdo | So kind of you always, keep it up!

The ink sticks were cool

They could have left the modern art out.

I’ve used inexpensive (low end) sumi and it is a treat to use and see the results. So black and smooth. I can only imagine how delightful high end sumi feels and looks.

On a miserable, dark and rainy day, this program is very inspiring and it cheers my heart. Thank you ❤

"The intricate work and dexterity required, means that these brushes are almost exclusively made by women"

Fantastic, I love when people work so hard to create something brilliant out of something devastating. Thank you, wishing you all the best of luck in your mission.😊

We made tattoo ink in a similar way collecting soot from a make shift baby oil and toilet paper candle and put a paper bag over it when I was in Taiwan there was nothing more satisfying than seeing artists use my ink I was working in one of the 5% shops for ink There’s something about being a part of passion influenced by creativity it’s a good feeling even without pay

I really appreciate how this narrator always makes an effort to pronounce foreign words as authentically as possible.

good show, apart from from the snail murdering

You guys should do Araish plaster from Rajsthan, its quite stunning and made with am interesting number of food ingredients

Great work! Thank you for this compilation. I enjoyed watching and learning from it.

nah the piece about the purple dye was incredible.

How do you figure out 5000 years ago that you can just crush a snail take that gland and wash it,let it rot,dry it,then use it as dye

He’s been making ink for 450 years damn that’s a long time. I hope he can retire soon

Produce like this exist in every country with a long history.

Amazing peoples that love so much what they do ❤ how bless the artists are to use these oils..be blessed each one ❤️

The entire modern "art" segment triggered tf out of me

49:29 whenever i use brushes from Sally's workspace #7, they seem to flow on my canvas like only a true English river of saliva can 👍 👌

I am in awe watching this… They do such an amazing job and it’s so tedious…. Crazy how talented they are. I could never afford anything they make but, WOW…

This was incredibly interesting! I love seeing how other artists create but especially when they do things that are either traditional and old or in a different way than what most people do nowadays. The only thing that concerns me, is the second to the last one about the reclaiming pollution. I know people don't eat paint, but artists get paint on them all the time. Also, they were talking about using it in a lot of ways that people would come in contact with it, including make-up. Maybe I missed something, but I didn't notice them talking about making the product safe.

Me explaining to my dad where the money he hid under the carpet for my education and college went...

it is so soothing to see its skilled people. I'm not a big fan of today's industries and waste! this is so durable in the long run! we need to go back in time and take care of what we have and live more sustainably! ❤️

Absolutely fascinating.

450 years!? Wow. Incredible

I need some of that muck paint!!

800 pounds of snails for a single washcloth? That's a crime

It's amazing, how many points of departure can exist in the seemingly simplest of things.

I find it interesting that the bonsai trees can be around eight hundred years old

I love when the paint is rollled like that 🤤

Yet here I am using the same bic pen for less than one dollar for years

Amazing craftsmanship!!!

This was an amazing documentary! Thank you

Why do I desperately want to take a large bite out of that raw ink

Brilliant...appreciate all of works

Detailed process and patience that goes along with it!

This was a cool video. I love the craftsmanship and love that these people have for their craft.

I seriously don't understand how a fragile, timely, and expensive process like this could be sustainable in an economy. If I made a product that needs specialists that require 10 years of training, making a product that can go bad, there's just no way it'd work. But.. here we are!