How to Draw Japan

About this book

Draw the structure itself — not the view, not the river under it, the bridge. This book teaches 100 crossings of Japan in six unchanging steps: one honest bridge taken apart into deck, girder, pier, abutment and railing; every basic answer to a gap — beam, slab, arch, truss, suspension cable and the fan of stays; twenty real bridges drawn as form portraits, from Kintaikyō's five wooden arches and Meganebashi's twin stone eyes to the longest span on earth at Akashi — recognisable by proportion alone, with no water, no town and no season to help; the torii taken apart and typed, kasagi, nuki and pillar, from the straight shinmei to the three-pillared mihashira; the working gates of temple, castle and town — sanmon, karamon, yaguramon, nagayamon — drawn as frames with roofs, posts and leaves; and finally the parts at full size: giboshi, bearing, expansion joint, cutwater, arch ring, the gate leaf and its pivot. Every lesson declares its span before a line is drawn, and ends with a practice page. No people, no statues, no scenery: just the crossing, at its true proportions, until you can draw it from memory.