On July 3rd I gave Earth to Hatsumi Sensei
Below is a short video of my meeting with Sensei (including a sneak peek of Earth).
Pre-order Earth now to save 10%
Earth is coming!
If you have Heaven, you'll be glad to know that Masaaki Hatsumi: Dojo Giga | Earth is coming. Photography for Earth is completed and our writing, and translations, and layouts are done too. We're moving forward and we're taking advance orders now.
The subject of Heaven was martial virtue. Earth is bloody different...
The theme of our first Dojo Giga book, Heaven, was martial virtue: military force used properly — namely to create civilization and maintain peace. Unfortunately, man ignores Heaven’s lessons and abuses power…
Ignorance, rage and desire
Earth's theme is bonno 煩悩, afflictions understood in Buddhism to be rooted in misconceptions and the cause of suffering. Specifically, Earth helps us meditate on those of Hatsumi Sensei's paintings which illustrate “the three poisons” of ignorance, rage and desire.
Will Earth look like Heaven?
Earth's design is based on Heaven (on the shelf, it'll look like Heaven's evil twin). Earth will come in a folding case like Heaven but it won't have a shikishi board for signature. Earth features a larger number of paintings than Heaven and more action photos.
Pre-order Earth to save 10%!
We had multiple successful Kickstarters for Hatsumi Sensei's art projects (and that was great) but Kickstarter takes a cut... For Earth, we're cutting out Kickstarter so I can give a 10% discount to you! We'll take pre-orders on this page (and give the first 600 book orders a 10% discount) and then we'll print Earth.
Pre-order Earth for a 10% discount.
Pre-order three for the 10% discount and free postage.
Earth is $130 but if you order early (to get the 10% discount) your price will be just $117 plus postage.
- Postage to Europe, Australia, or New Zealand is $50
- Postage to the US, Canada and Japan is $30
- For free postage, get three books — order with your friends! That's a savings of $90 or $150 (depending on your delivery location).
One Earth Book
Delivery to Europe, Australia, or New Zealand included.
One Earth Book
Delivery to the US, Canada or Japan included.
Three Earth Books
FREE delivery to Europe, Australia, NZ, US, Canada or Japan included.
Can we deliver to other locations?
Our postage fee includes more than just postage — it also covers boxing, handling, bulk shipping by boat, plus the inevitable tariffs... All these costs are difficult to estimate so we'll consider other delivery destinations later. If your address is outside where we're currently delivering (but you'd like to order early to get the 10% discount) consider ordering with a friend living in one of our delivery destinations.
Packaging
We'll shrink wrap Earth and then individually box each book at the printer. Then we'll pack them (three boxed books to a carton). If you get a carton of three books, your delivery will get the extra protection of being double boxed.
Frequently Asked Questions
St Ingbert, Germany Presentation
Earth will feature multiple paintings about Saitō Musashibō Benkei. I gave a speech about these paintings in August of 2022, in Germany. A video of the speech is below.
Dayton, Ohio Presentation
In October of 2021, I traveled with Nagato Sensei to the USA for a taikai hosted by the Dayton Bujinkan Dojo. I was invited to speak about Hatsumi Sensei's art at the event's banquet. A video of the speech — with sample Earth pages — is below.
Earth Production Updates
- December 20th, 2021: Layouts for the first 185 pages of Earth are done and proofreading has begun.
- December 30th: The commentary section, which begins after page 185, is drafted.
- January 5th, 2022: I'm confirming plans with our printer.
- April 4th: The commentary section is translated and editing has begun. The commentary for Earth is much longer than the commentary for Heaven!
- May 16th: Layouts for the first 185 pages of Earth are looking great!
- May 30th: Our printer approved the Earth project. Now the fun of seeing our concept become a physical reality begins.
- June 20th: Earth will be 240 pages (that's 16 pages longer than Heaven).
- July 3rd: I gave Earth to Hatsumi Sensei. He is pleased so we're moving forward with another round of proofreading.
- August 14th: I met with Hatsumi Sensei to review edits and give a status update.
- August 27th: At the banquet for Nagato Sensei's Taikai in Germany, I spoke about Earth (with a focus on Hatsumi Sensei's painting of Saitō Musashibō Benkei).
- September 4th: I updated Hatsumi Sensei on the Germany Taikai and received Sensei's approval for Earth edits.
- October 29th: I reported on Earth progress and got Sensei's okay for a big edit in our commentary section. Now our final proofreading can proceed.
- January 30th, 2023: Earth proofreading — in both languages — is complete. Final text took longer than expected, but I’m pleased with our work. Thank you for your patience.
- February 12th: Earth features multiple paintings of Saitō Musashibō Benkei. I gave a speech about these paintings in August of 2022 at Nagato Sensei's Taikai in Germany (the speech is posted on this page). Also a PDF about the Bloody Daruma painting which was featured in our set of prints and which will appear in Earth is available (the PDF is posted near the bottom of this page).
A Sneak Peek
In 2017 we made a set of 13 posters called Masaaki Hatsumi: Art Prints. Eight paintings featured on the prints (plus one promoting Sensei's art exhibition at the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan) appeared in Heaven. Four paintings featured on the prints will appear in Earth. For each print, we're making PDFs. These PDFs share a quotation from Hatsumi Sensei and a bit of commentary from the Heaven and Earth books. I hope these PDFs help us appreciate the prints and give us a fun sneak peek at Earth.
All the Prints are Sold. Right?
The Dayton Bujinkan Dojo has a small quantity of prints. (We sent the last prints to Dayton, Ohio so participants at Nagato Sensei's 2021 Taikai could purchase them.) While they last, you can order the full set of 13 prints here: tinylink.net/MANIT
A chat about Meditation
Paul Masse and I talked about Meiso 瞑想, which means "meditation" and is one of the paintings which will appear in Earth. Join us in the below video.
For more about Kasumian, please visit: https://kasumian.com/
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