Contest: to enjoy the best of Martial Arts, take a picture!
While the winter holidays will gradually cross France with their very cool temperatures, Journal du Japon invites you to warm up with a competition dedicated to martial arts and photography: send us your best martial arts photos ! To win, from February 10 to 24, books dedicated to this theme and especially 11 places for the 34th Festival of martial Arts that will take place on Saturday, March 23, 2019 at the Accor Hotels Arena in Paris !
The 34th Martial Arts Festival, with Bushido Karate
We went to meet the organizers of this festival which has now more than three decades to tell us more about its genesis, its organization, and its content, complying with karate Bushido!
Hello Karate Bushido. Could you introduce yourself to our readers?
Bushido karate Bruce Lee Karaté Bushido is the leading martial arts and combat sports magazine. The magazine has been around for more than 40 years and has organized the Paris Bercy Martial Arts Festival for more than 30 years. It also comes with a digital version, a Facebook page (45,000 fans) and above all a YouTube channel “official Bushido Karate” that gathers 200,000 subscribers around reports and interviews of experts and great masters.
Why did you wait until Bruce Lee disappeared to start a festival like this and create your magazine? In memory?
The death of Bruce Lee in 1974 was the trigger for the creation of the magazine and the Festival because there was a great worldwide surge around the Little Dragon: becoming an icon, he brought together all martial arts practitioners, young and old, around a true philosophy of martial practice.
Sports values are fundamental to us: Bushido in “karate Bushido” is the Code of honor of the Samurai in its modern extension.
For 33 years now that the festival exists have there been any notable developments in the martial arts community? In France, in Europe or internationally?
The world of martial arts is intimately linked to Asia. Of course, since the end of the 1980s, and as a result of globalization, there has been a growing interest in the martial arts of Japan, China and Korea, notably: the Samurai, The Monk of Shaolin, are figures who have made millions of practitioners dream.
It is also a world in constant movement: practices evolve because practitioners themselves evolve. The growing proportion of women practicing in France, for example, attests to this. With them, it is a whole area of self-defense, with krav-maga in mind, that we see developing, because their considerations of martial arts are very much focused on security, self-preservation, risk assessment… but we also see an upsurge of women’s inscriptions in boxing clubs (French, English, foot-fists).
Finally, the evolutions are also linked to changes in the collective imagination, “fashions” as in all other sports: Karate, Kung Fu and Judo fascinated all the fans of Bruce Lee, Jet Li, Chuck Norris in the 70s and 80s. There was also the Jean-Claude Van Damme period. Today the discipline that has the most influence is unquestionably MMA, with large world organizations like UFC, Bellator, RoadFC behind.
Did the Festival play a role?
The Festival has, of course, played a role in the evolution of practices and mentalities.
When in the 1980s, for the first time in France, a delegation of monks from Shaolin moved for a demonstration at the Festival, it was suddenly an entire world opening up for the French public. People were speechless!
Devoting entire demonstrations to women combatants has also been a way of encouraging a more balanced practice of martial arts.
Generally speaking, the Martial Arts Festival is intended to be the initiator of trends: you have to know how to detect them and stage them with the precise figures on the bow.
Is the audience listening more and more present than in the beginning?
The audience has been renewed but has not changed much: it is still made up of martial arts experts and families who come more simply to watch a good show. However, with the emergence of social networks, it is certain that the public communicates much more around the event (before, during and after).
What is the Will behind involving many disciplines?
The idea has always been to make the Festival a festival gathering the whole family of international martial arts: from the great traditional Japanese master to the action cinema cascade, from the monk of Shaolin to the French Savate boxing…we find this spirit of gathering well during the show where the disciplines follow each other, but also behind the scenes, where everyone takes pictures, welcomes each other, encourages each other…
Have they ever lived together?
Yes, we have sometimes proposed demonstrations combining several disciplines: for example in 2015 where for its Jubilee, star Jérôme Le Banner made a demonstration following his martial path, starting with karate to go to the pieds-fists and the MMA. Also this year we have an event with the champion and Youtuber Grégory Bouchelaghem who also retraces his demonstration path, starting with karate, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and the fight to go to Thai boxing and MMA.
What is Japan’s current place in the martial arts today as a founding reference, but also terms of competitions, according to you?
Japan continues to be the mainstay of martial arts today. We can see it at the level of competitions, for example at the last Karate Open on January 27, 2019, in Paris, where the Japanese(es) won a good part of the medals. Karate, Judo, Jujitsu, and Aikido are among the pillars on which the entire martial arts of today are built. Let’s not forget to recall that the MMA, literally Mixed Martial Arts, is precisely the sum of a multitude of techniques from martial arts known as “more traditional” »…
I mean, if you had a message to convey to attract our readers, what would it be?
To continue to come many to attend the Festival of Martial Arts, which is a unique, magical event, program renewed every year with the world’s greatest stars, champions and experts, an evening of culture and sport and an instant trip to Asia!
