Title: untitled
Materials: mixed media on wood
Size:H30 × W24 × D3 cm
Year: 2019
Description:
In my creative process, I do not consciously dwell upon the fact that I am Japanese. Yet, when I revisit my finished works, I notice numerous ghost-like entities blending plant and animal forms with the human body. At such times, I sense the influence of Japanese folktales familiar since childhood, alongside television and film. I sometimes wonder whether, in distant times when science and theory couldn’t explain natural disasters, humanity and society progressed by attributing such phenomena to these beings. This allowed people to find closure, establish emotional anchors, and move forward without constant rejection or conflict. The creatures depicted in works like Chōjū-jinbutsu-giga (Bird and Beast Comic Pictures) or by Katsushika Hokusai are imaginary yet feel familiar and approachable.
I hope the beings appearing in my work become little talismans for each viewer, enabling them to find subtle colour in their daily lives.
Artist Statement:
I deliberately avoid holding onto a specific image I wish to paint.
Today I’ll use this colour, combine this material with that drawing. That’s where it begins. Even as I progress with visualising the vague image in my mind, a gap remains between me and the canvas, and it struggles to connect. I layer colours, draw and erase, then draw lines again. Gradually, I internalise these actions into my body. Repeating this work in a stillness so profound you could discern the day’s weather, the presence of what should be drawn emerges unexpectedly. My hand catches the tempo and completes it in one swift stroke. When the work gazes back at me, a present relationship forms between us, and that is when it is finished.
My work is difficult to put into words.
In the process of a flower withering, I feel a quiet yet undeniable vitality. The loneliness and sense of emptiness that living things carry, I find human and endearing. There is a unique satisfaction in them, distinct from negativity, and by expressing these, I simply try to create a calm, simple moment that exists there.
Things are hard to stop when moving, and hard to move when still. I mix up the various contradictions within myself and sketch them out.
My creative process is unclear and far from free-flowing.
I don’t aspire to make things simple and easy to understand. I pursue triggers for a different expression than before, shaping “this is absolutely it” and “what is here” alongside the materials.