Nureki & Yukimura – Dialogue in SM Spirits, February 1993
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The following translation from the magazine SM Spirits has been done by Shiba. Commissioned and edited by Bergborg/ Kinbaku Books.
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Chimuo Nureki VS Haruki Yukimura (Part 1)
The famous bakushi Chimuo Nureki, and the sharp SM-video director-bakushi Haruki Yukimura… These two men, well-known to people with a passion for ropes, are creating a video-work together. In this issue, we offer the rope-loving readers of SM Spirits some photos from the shooting of this video. We also include a report from ”Kinbiken”, a regular gathering for those searching for the beauty of kinbaku.
This is our report from the Taiyo Tosho video-shooting site:
Chimuo Nureki’s part of the video was shot in a Japanese style house. The model was in kimono, and had her hair in nihongami. The work presents a kind of ”beauty of kinbaku” that Mr. Nureki has been cultivating and exploring for a long time.
When we asked him to come and do the dialogue with Mr. Yukimura for our magazine [see Part 2 below], Mr. Nureki told us that he and Mr. Yukimura were in the processes of making a video together for Taiyo Tosho – a really luxurious video for the enthusiasts [the Japanese word is ”maniacs”]. We quickly requested to get a permission to attend and shoot some stills from the site. And we got it.
The first day of the shooting, the scenes of Mr. Nureki was shot in a Japanese style house in Setagaya, Tokyo. (The house was also used for SM Spirits 1992 November issue’s photos of Izumi Morikawa and this month’s of Misao Tachibana.) His lifework is devoted to the beauty created by the tied female body and the jute rope that binds it, ”the beauty of kinbaku”. The main purpose of Mr. Nureki’s part of the video was to allow the camera to capture this beauty. The model was dressed in a kimono and had the hair in nihongami, probably in order to let the beauty of kinbaku stand out. The models were Ms. Asami Hirose with her light colored skin and well-shaped breasts, and Ms. Eriko Machida who knows how to look good in a kimono and who has also been seen in this magazine earlier. The facial expressions of these women in Mr. Nureki’s ropes transforms into the melancholic… This is the world of the beauty of kinbaku.
The second day of the shooting was quite different from the one with with Mr. Nureki. The shooting was done in a studio with wooden floor, and the model wore a skin-tight dress. Mr. Yukimura’s style is directed towards beauty of bondage and the fetishism engendered by the ropes and the female body. When you hear ”bondage” [ボンデージ], you might think of John Willie etc, but in Mr. Yukimura’s bondage those American bondage poses are tied by jute ropes, and Mr. Nureki’s influences can be seen in it. If we say that Mr. Nureki’s restriction shows beauty by a kind of bondage that changes the form of the female body, Mr. Yukimura’s shows the beauty of the female body form as it emerges by how he puts ropes on it. I can’t make any comment on the video as such, since I haven’t watched it yet, but I can say without a doubt that it will be a ”must watch” video for people who like the beauty of the female body bound by ropes. The video is planned to be released in late January to early February from Taiyo Tosho.
Report from a ”Kinbiken” gathering
Kinbakubi kenkyukai – Kinbiken. This group has the bakushi Chimuo Nureki and the photographer Akio Fuji at its core, and gathers enthusiasts who are haunted by beauty of kinbaku. The meeting seems peaceful [なごやか], but it is actually a game played in real earnest [真剣勝負] between the members and Mr. Nureki.
We got the chance to observe one of the monthly meetings because of Mr. Nureki’s kindness. We were told in advance that they avoid visits by non-members of the club as much as possible, and indeed the members keep a distance from us, just like water and oil does. Once the meeting starts, Mr. Nureki performs precisely the shibari the members request. The model of the day is Ms. Fuyuko Kiano who is well-known to the people who know Kinbiken, and Ms. Maya Ougi who modeled three times for the meeting today. Since they use only models who really like rope, the two models quickly begin showing ecstatic expressions when tied. It’s seldom seen in SM videos just how sexy women getting intoxicated by ropes are. I was amazed that the beauty of kinbaku created by just ropes and female bodies without any pornographic items (exposure of genitals or use of vibrators are not happening at these meetings) can be so full of eroticism and stimulate the observer.
Chimuo Nureki VS Haruki Yukimura (Part 2)
Yukimura: Should we start this by speaking about the first time Nureki san and I met?
Nureki: Yes. It began with the making of the documentary film The World of Kou Minomura. So, let’s start with that.
Y: I got an offer from the president of Cinemagic. He asked me if I would be interested in being the director for The World of Kou Minomura. It was an honor for me to receive such a task. And I met Nureki san for the first time then, working as the director for this film. I considered presenting it as ”Part 1”, to be followed by a ”Part 2”, and maybe a ”Part 3”, but the president wanted it all in one video if possible. It was a quite struggle to edit everything into a single 60 minutes long video. I wanted to show the whole talk between Minomura san and Nureki san in the video, but at the same time I had a need to make something that the viewers would be happy with, too. Sometimes it is good to be an enthusiast, and at the same time not so good. So, I ended up showing Nureki san’s and Minomura san’s shibari, and put the sound of their conversation on top of these visuals, and thus managed to edit all of it into one video.
N: I still receive letters saying ”it is a master piece” from subscribers of Kinbiken Communications. The video took time and energy to do, and it shows in the result.
Y: It took me two months in total to finish the work.
Shimazaki: The starting point of Minomura san and Nureki san’s conversation in the film is a dialog with Yumi Asano, a model who was starring also in the S&M-video called Graffiti 3 [グラフティ 3]. By the way, I think that was the first occurrence in which Nureki sensei did talking in a video (if we don’t count the self-produced videos). Is this correct?
N: I don’t think… – was it?
S: Anyway, it is a valuable video for the enthusiasts, since it includes you talking while you tie in the film.
N: That was spontaneous. Without the talking, I wouldn’t have found out how to proceed with the tie. I’m glad they didn’t edit it away. Let me tell you something before I forget to mention it: There is a new video which Mr. Takatsuki is directing and that is being published by Cinemagic. I am in it and the video is really great.
S: Please do not speak more about it, don’t spoil it. By the way, I really liked the video that came out from Art Video in which you had a role as a monk…
N: People have asked me to do something like that again.
Y: I started appearing in videos because I had that video in my mind (laugh).
N: (laugh) I know a guy named Taro Kai [甲斐太郎] who often appears in works of Art Video. He has a weird eye for SM. He intentionally places himself lower than the others peoples eye level when he acts in videos. Typically, he acts as a beggar, shoe polisher, or vagrant who is cruising the streets. So, at one time, he and I acted as monks that beg [乞食ぼうず]. It felt like I was transferred to another world, a very masochistic world. A woman looked at me with despised look when I took a glance at her leg (laugh). And we moved to Shinjuku Central Park and sat on the grass… Then a pretty girl happened to pass by. The girl is the girl who also appears in The World of Kou Minomura. I told the president of Cinemagic that I’ve found a very attractive girl. Well, let me tell you about the girl. In the video I mentioned, the scene suddenly switches to a room in an apartment. In the script, it turns out that the monk wasn’t really a beggar but actually a man who is working in a decent company. He was just acting as a beggar for amusement. That was the story. I did quite cruel things to the girl together with Taro Kai. We did things like inserting finger in her ass and applying an enema. After the filming, she didn’t come out from the shower for a long time. The shower room was on the balcony, on the 7th floor. We joked saying to each other: ”We better watch out! What if she jumps out from 7th floor!” About an hour later, she came out of the shower and said: ”That felt so good.” She also said: ”The SM videos I’ve been in before were all boring and I didn’t feel like watching them, but I do want to watch this one.” Then I thought: ”She is really something!”, and recommended her.
Y: There was an interesting episode during the shooting of The World of Kou Minomura as well. The model Ruka Mikami was in a rope-suspension for a long time. During the video-shoot, another girl stepped in to save Ruka. In the script, she actually wasn’t supposed to come in to the scene – but she did because she had pity on Ruka.
N: I still tease Ruka about this… I still think the scene was more interesting before the girl came in to help her…
Y: There was another happening after we’d finished shooting almost all the shibari scenes. Ruka came to me and begged me to let her do some girl-on-girl action. I thought it’s not so bad to have different varieties of scenes, so I let her do it although the other girl had no experience of this. They started making out. Ruka started fucking the girl energetically in a dark corner of the room while we were preparing for the next scene after we were done with shooting their making-out scene. Many masochists seem to have potential of being bisexual… None of them were just acting this scene. They reminded me of two white snakes tangling up on each other. I was so moved… Ruka looked tiny next to the other girl who was over 160 cm tall… And tiny Ruka was on top and making the other girl moan. Then we were about to shoot the suspension-scene with Ruka, that I mentioned earlier. When I suspended her, Ruka said to me: ”Sensei, tie my mouth, and lift the rope up and connect it to my leg please. You saw me fucking the girl. Now, give me a rope-gag as a punishment.” It was actually the last time I worked with her, although I would like to do it again… Anyway: that’s how I met Nureki san (laugh).
S: I wondered why you didn’t sell The World of Kou Minomura at a lower price and purchase only, not rental.
Y: Cinemagic wanted the video to sell.
N: Since they invested much money on it.
Y: So, I had the thought in my head that I need to make it understandable for general viewers.
S: But the work has the point of view of a kinbaku enthusiast. It has a different camera-angle, compared with the regular shootings.
Y: Right. That’s because I was inspired by the perspective Minomura san had when he was making Kitan Club, and I felt I had to make something that enthusiasts would be happy with, even though the main target is general viewers. Otherwise it would not be sold much. Minomura san was saying the same thing.
N: Of course, that is how it is.
S: Enthusiasts sometimes say ”it’s boring” – but they buy SM-videos anyway. They buy videos expecting there wouldn’t be even 5 minutes of their favorite scenes in the 60-minute video, maybe it’s just one minute, or 30 seconds. But even only for these 30 seconds, they are happy with it.
S: I’ve been making collection of my favorite scenes from videos, but there aren’t many scenes I can use out of videos these days. Regarding Cinemagic’s videos, they spend so much effort on lighting and still doesn’t show what I want to see, even if it’s a good scene. The rope-frictions are blurred for instance. And sometimes, they show male actors close up (laugh).
Y: (Wry laugh)
S: I definitely do not pick out those scenes for my collection (laugh).
N: I have always been wondering why they do these things. I think the ones who are creating videos have strong aspiration for films, movies. And that can lead to bad result when they make SM videos.
S: Well, maybe it’s bad according to enthusiasts. But for general viewers…
N: Close ups of male actors are not needed, even by general viewers.
Y: There are a few who like it, I believe…
N: There are a few of course. A few. Who is in the video? Was that you? (laugh)
Y: …Give me a break (laugh).
N: Did you start your career by making movies?
Y: Only videos. It’s hard to do SM in movies.
N: Incidentally, among the staff at Cinemagic there are quite a few people who been involved in movie making. I reflected on this question recently and came to the conclusion that SM is for video camera. It’s for video camera essentially.
Y: Film is good too, but to really tell a story, it takes lots of time and needs good equipment. If you want to appeal something mentally, then films work.
S: Nikkatsu roman porn…
N: I think the bad influence of Nikkatsu roman porn still exists. Oh, I really think so. I thought about it just the other day.
Y: SM is not a suitable theme for a movie camera.
N: That’s right.
Y: Initially, my videos were too much directed towards the enthusiasts, and the story got lost (wry laugh). You have no choice but reducing the importance of the story if you want to really spend time on the bondage scenes. I’m still learning by trial and error, even now.
S: My imagination helps me fill in the background stories.
Y: It does, doesn’t it? (laugh)
N: It’s no good if the videos are not made for viewers who are able to understand the story by themselves with help of their own imagination. So, you should eliminate all the unnecessary parts, and leave some blank space for the viewers. Blank spaces which they can fill out with their own imagination. I once did the shibari for the director Yoshihiro Wakatsuki’s first movie. The director said: ”The movie got lost because I put too much things in it”. So I said: ”It’s such a great thing that it got lost. What’s interesting about making something you don’t get lost in.” But moviemakers don’t think like we do, it seems.
N: There is something I’ve been wondering all the time. I wonder what the beauty of rope is. I want to know what beautiful shibari is, and what not-beautiful shibari is.
Y: The reactions [リアクション] of the girls in rope, probably.
N: Can we say that it’s a beautiful shibari if only the reaction is good [リアクションさえよければ]?
Y: Uh, reactions…what can I say.
N: If that is the case, the girls who are sensitive, the girls who are sensitive to any kind of shibari would always give you good reactions. So what then decides if one is good at tying, or bad?
Y: I told you that I like your shibari because it’s loose once, remember? I mean, I tended to tie tight… and I found it uninteresting. Then I saw your rope and it was loose.
N: Is my rope loose?
Y: No, just listen to me please.
N: I know what you mean. But I asked you anyway (laugh).
Y: It’s different from the ropes just becoming loose. Your ropes move and change their form gradually. They become a little crooked, or the ropes are pulled apart from each other. And when I see it, I think: ”That is so good.” What I wanted to say is that it is not always good just because it’s tied neatly and tight.
N: I don’t calculate it beforehand.
Y: You don’t? I am less experienced than you, but I know it’s not easy to do. The total amount of people I’ve tied reached 100 recently, and only now I have started to understand it.
N: I was doing my current shibari already since I tied the very first person. I’ve tied about 3000 times now, so about 3000 people. Well, I’ve tied same girl more than once, so it isn’t exactly 3000 people – but something like that. And my style hasn’t changed since I was tying girls for the Uramado-magazine. I didn’t look at what Kou Minomura was doing, I just worked on my own, and he admired it saying: ”Oh – – – -”.
Y: Minomura san doesn’t use many ropes at all. He doesn’t bring more than five ropes with him. He started his career with painting… using the name ”Reiko Kita”.
N: He is really good at it. Actually I like to use even less rope than Kou Minomura. I think it is better to use just one. The main reason why I use many ropes is that the editor of the SM Select-magazine wants me to. There are two types of people, the ones who like to see many ropes, and the ones who prefer fewer ropes. I think the ones who like to see many ropes are less of the ”enthusiast” kind. Let’s say I put a rope really well on the first try on a Kinbiken-meeting. I say: ”This one is good, I like it” and recommend the members to take photos of it. Even then, after a short while, they ask me to add more ropes.
S: That’s because the members wants to see you tying more.
Y: I’ve been seducing girls and then tying them since I was young. The best moment of tying for me is when I bring their arms to the back. It moves me.
S: That moment is the best.
N: That moment, indeed.
Y: I wonder… I guess it is because it’s the rope of that moment. But the members want to see sensei’s shibari on different body parts of the models, on the chest, the buttocks, and the crotch for example.
S: I would like to hear some more comments from Nureki sensei about the loose rope that we talked about earlier.
N: Loose, it means that there is some space left. A space that allows the girl to move and show various poses and expressions.
S: Plasticity, if we see it objectively. Is that it?
N: Yes, it is, of course.
Y: It is. It can be a situation where the rope should be for example vertical or in the middle, but the important thing is always that the rope is matching well with the girls’ motions and poses.
N: Tying girls is not like tying a bag of rice [Komedawara]. It may sound pathetic, but I tie the girls’ heart. There is a way to tie a heart. When you tie them in that way, their hearts absolutely comes to you.
N: There is something I told him when we worked together to shoot a video for Taiyo Tosho. And what I said even made myself feel euphoric… I thought: ”What good words.” (laugh) What I said was: ”If you want to be good at shibari, stop thinking of using vibrators and such things after tying. Just do shibari. Then you will become better at it.” Being greedy by having thoughts of doing something else after tying will not help you becoming good at it, no matter how long you keep tying, for 10 years or 20 years.
Y: I agree.
N: So, you won’t get better if you are planning on shooting fuck scenes or sex scenes. But… if you won’t get better at it, then of course I can keep staying on the top of this world. (laugh)
Y: No need to worry, I will not reach your level! (laugh)
S: Now it seems good time to end the dialog.
Comment from the Editor Haruka Shimazaki:
I think this was a dialogue with very rich content. I had to edit out quite a lot of it, since the amount of pages we can use for this is limited. What a waste. I think it’s my duty to publish the rest somehow. I even considered to sacrifice some of the other standing sections of this magazine for this dialogue. The reason why the content became so rich is that they are both on ”this side”. I mean they are both experts in this world. I believe the deep talk between them will be a treasure for enthusiasts.
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[Footnotes for the enthusiasts by KinbakuBooks / Bergborg:
* The video-shooting referred to in the report resulted in a video with the title 縄恋秘抄. This video has later been re-released on DVD (2001). This video not only has scenes with Nureki tying and scenes with Yukimura tying as mentioned in the text – in the last scene, they are tying (and untying) together, side by side. Indeed a ”must watch”. (The DVD is the one in the small square cover on the first image of this post. Do not confuse this film with the DVD with the same title done by Naka Akira with Itsuki Karin in 2015.)
* The video Jouen. The World of Kou Minomura (VHS in 1989) was released on DVD in 2013. Here is the title in Japanese for easier searching: 縄炎 ～美濃村晃の世界～. Ironically, when released on DVD, the 60 minutes were now percieved as too short, and a (totally unrelated) additional SM-video was added. (The cover can be seen in the first image of this post.)
* The video Graffiti 3 mentioned by Shimazaki has also been re-released on DVD, available in the Cinemagic collection with the title S&Mビデオグラフティ 第3集 (2015). (See image below.)
Kinbaku Books 