In China, they carve watermelons: Below are the winners of a recent contest - (amazing art!)

Private Email | JUNE 29, 2005 | Unknown

[nuconvert]

WOW!

[riri]

Jees, and I don't even have the patients to cut a straight slice...

[Chili Girl]

those are beautiful!

[Cecily]

They are all great, but I love the Van Gogh melon.

[Steve_Seattle]

Idolatry! Foolishness! Satanism! Destroy them!

[jpsb]

bump

[Onelifetogive]

Jees, and I don't even have the patients to cut a straight slice...

Are you a doctor...or did you mean patience?

[tet68]

Isn't it sad to see western influence seeping into indiginous art, just another example of our corrupting
society.

/sarcasm

[Spruce]

This is way cool!

[streetpreacher]

Oh, that's nothing. Now if they dipped one of those melons in a bucket of urine and stuck a cross in it, then it would be ART.

[Steve_Seattle]

One of them appears to depict a mosque, but at least none of them says, "Death to America."

[Theresawithanh]

Those are awesome! I'd seen the second one posted here on FR a day or so ago, but didn't know what it was from.

[Talking_Mouse]

Wow. That is amazing.

[Blue Champagne]

Thanks, Charlite - lovely stuff.

[livius]

They are beautiful! Sort of like large vegetable (oh, ok, fruit) cameos.

[OB1kNOb]

Beautiful artwork, but I much prefer this method.......mmmm

[Little Pig]

That's the Taj Mahal, Magoo.

[easonc52]

Incredible! I need to expand my imagination... Thanks for the post.

[Steve Van Doorn]

Time to eat!

[Onelifetogive]

Isn't it sad to see western influence seeping into indigenous art, just another example of our corrupting society.

The sick part of people who actually think like that is that they encourage US to adopt things from other cultures to expand our understanding of the world, but they want indigenous cultures to remain backward and unenlightened.....

[Revolting cat!]

[Little Pig]

Neat. Also, the top one is a Winter melon, not a watermelon. The chinese have many "melons" not often seen here in the states, including one called a "bitter melon" which tastes atrocious, yet is used often enough in cooking to warrant inclusion on a menu here in the states.

[reagan_fanatic]

Nice ,um, melons.

[Proud_texan]

I'm a little rusty but the characters in the third image look like Japanese kanji. Could it be that these were carved in Japan?

In any event great stuff, thanks.

[Fitzcarraldo]

Bookmarked...put in the China "plus" column...

[Republicanprofessor]

Art ping.

Let Sam Cree or me know if you want on or off the ping list.

Pretty amazing images.

[crazyhorse691]

Neat. Thanks for posting the pictures that took 232.88 seconds to load with my dial-up:))
Picture #2 was seen last night on the live thread for President Bushs speech:0

[CHARLITE]

"...but I love the Van Gogh melon."...Yes! That's my favorite, too. Coming in 2nd, IMO, is the baseball hitter. Astonishing type of artistic expression!

Thanks for your comment!

Char :)

[Melas]

Well, I guess it's kinda of a mosque, but it's the Taj Mahal, which has significance far and beyond that of a mere mosque.

[Republicanprofessor]

Okay, I see Manet, Discobolus, van Gogh.

Can you identify the other artists? :)

[siunevada]

Really cool! I'm getting hungry, though.

[eleni121]

Ping!

[fortunecookie]

Oh my gosh, those are amazing, just beautiful. Wow. They're so delicate and artistic. I expected lovely carvings or sculptures, but wow.

And quite possibly delicious, too. ;-)

[fortunecookie]

Ping for art!

[txhurl]

knockout bump

[streetpreacher]

Jees, and I don't even have the patients to cut a straight slice...

Doc, you should read "Freakonomics". Be honest; the reason you don't have any patients is BECAUSE you can't cut a straight slice.

[nina0113]

I think that's the Taj Mahal.

[Xanadu2112]

The Sumo wrestler is Asoshoriyu. He is the man in Japanese Sumo and he is also Mongolian. I saw him in action and he was a bad mother.

[moose2004]

We're doomed!

[Lazamataz]

The Sumo wrestler is Asoshoriyu. He is the man in Japanese Sumo and he is also Mongolian. I saw him in action and he was a bad mother.....

(Shut your mouth!)

I'm just talkin' bout Asoshoriyu!

(We can dig it!)

[PayNoAttentionManBehindCurtain]

.

[BipolarBob]

bttt

[RedBeaconNY]

That 'mosque' is the Taj Mahal.

[PayNoAttentionManBehindCurtain]

Did you all see this?

Becky

[perfect stranger]

Seedless?

[Androcles]

Kanji are based on the Chinese writing system, often still unmodified. It'd be interesting to know exactly where they were carved since the Japanese characters use the old unsimplified characters which are 90% used outside China now (Except for Singapore) but now rarer within it (Except on old signage and in some smaller towns).

[Steve_Seattle]

"That 'mosque' is the Taj Mahal."

You're probably right; it's not that distinct to me.

[Revolting cat!]