Scratch Art (Itchiness is an Explosion!)

Is this an era where anything can be art?

If it were me, I would turn my sensitive skin—a condition called dermatographia—to my advantage and embody that art by scratching my forearms with my fingernails. (Please rest assured, this is just for fun, not a way of hurting myself.)

First, I use my fingernails to scratch my forearms very lightly. After a few minutes, the scratched areas slowly swell into red welts. If I write letters or draw pictures with my nails while scratching, I can create simple illustrations or cartoons.

That said, this itchiness (the symptom) also has a level of suffering that words cannot convey. The marks from a dress shirt or socks... even just holding a ballpoint pen or pencil makes me itch... The trigger might be small, but I end up itching all over to the point where the root cause becomes unclear. Even now, the area around my socks is itchy. When the itching is severe, I can't sleep (lol).

?

No, it's not funny.

Depending on the illness, there are types of itchiness that are incomparably stronger and more unbearable than mine. Even if I complain about being itchy, it's just a level of complaining that I can afford to make.

Because I am this way, I make it a point to turn this itchiness to my advantage and work on my creations every day.

Suffering from itchiness,
turning itchiness into art,
forgetting the itchiness.

Well, even if I call it art, it's just scribbles. The other day, while I was bathing, my son thought it would be funny to doodle. He wrote 'poop'.

A few minutes after being scratched... the three characters my son wrote emerged slowly, but clearly enough to be read. Compared to scribbles made with a pencil or marker, this is on a completely different level. The way it slowly emerges, the ultra-fine swelling that carries the fluctuation of the welt... and that indescribable red color (perhaps apple-colored?).

And the most artistic part of this three-character art...

is that before you even have time to savor the three characters (huh?), they fade away. Even those three characters, which can hardly be called elegant, disappear without a trace. This [process of fading away] is the art.

However, at the same time, this fleeting art that fades away is extremely annoying and unpleasant. Needless to say, it triggers a rush of itchiness. Since explaining this and that might trigger the itch, I will just repeat that it is extremely, extremely annoying.

...

Nothingness. Art might be about creating something from nothing... but first, that nothingness itself is the canvas of art. Next, the process of trying to create something on that canvas of nothingness is also art. Furthermore, the letters or pictures that appear as a result are also art. Furthermore, savoring those letters or pictures is also art. Furthermore, the process of changing and fading away moment by moment, whether in a few minutes or hundreds of years, is also art. Finally, the canvas of nothingness truly disappears, both physically and from everyone's mind. That is the end of art.

An aesthetic of leaving nothing behind. No, that's not it.

It is an aesthetic because it doesn't remain. I feel that things unrelated to my own intentions are important. Perhaps the various things on the internet that remain as they are are just a side effect of convenience.

Without shame, I call
this text and these scratch marks
art.

Even if someone points out the clutter in this incredibly messy office, I'll say, 'It's art!'

The slow, creeping approach of deadlines in life, work, play, and existence itself is terrifying. Even while screaming inside that it is scary, that sadness and that screaming are also art (including whether or not I choose to acknowledge them as such...)

I do not believe that being born is art (a miracle); rather, I perceive it as having popped into existence during the process of art. Beyond that, as an existence smaller than a grain of rice in the vast universe, I live within art and return to art. Even after I return, art continues on, pulse after pulse.

...

Here is a Koala's March.

This, too, is art, and
the fact that I will eat it and it will disappear is also
art.

Whether the koala feels that way
I have absolutely no idea,

but the feeling of not knowing is also...

Food, drink, and play
should be done as you please
without overthinking them.

Koala's March
Crunch, crunch, crunch!

This crunch
is music!

It is simply delicious.

To the many people suffering and struggling
with symptoms far, far worse than mine,
I pray from my heart for your recovery.