A lump of Feelings(’17-)
特別支援教育の現場で言葉を持たない生徒と関わった。直接的な激しい感情表現を目の当たりにして、身体が触れることによる伝達の強さを感じている。触覚は「確かにここに実在している」という感覚を最も強力に伝える。五感の中で最も発達が早く、赤ん坊が何にでも触り舐めて世界を知覚する最初の手法だ。触覚は硬さ、重さ、温度、延いては存在そのものであり、それらが同存する場が私の心象である。そこからごろりと転がり出る「かたまり」。
陶土は花崗岩が風化してできている。地表の岩石が太陽熱や気温により膨張収縮を繰り返し砕かれ、雨水がその岩に浸み込み変質分解して土化する。数年前、手にした陶土に関する本に六甲の風化花崗岩から信楽の岩石(花崗岩)に言及したくだりがあった。この本は、私が美大生時代の教科書の著者が書いた本である。阪神淡路大震災が起こったのも私が大学生の頃。震災当時に家を守ってくれたのがこの花崗岩(御影石)だった。自分の足元から手元のマテリアルについての話にどきりとした。
今シリーズで、新たに石と土を共に焼いた。これは触覚的テクスチャーへの関心と元々同質だった物質を同時焼成することによる窯変への興味に起因する。石は焼くことで、うねり、裂け、熔解などの変化を起こす。土は柔らかさや粘りを持ち、その土は焔によりやきもの特有の硬さと光沢を宿す。石と土は繋がった一つの形に成形して焼くことで、「割れ、欠け」という現象が起こる。「割れ、欠け」はやきものという伝統においてネガティヴな傷(そこない)と捉えられるが、反面それを「継ぎ」で繕うことでポジティブな価値を見出す。本来「継ぎ」は漆を用いるのが常だが、私は「継ぎ」を雲母で施し、再焼成して永久的に定着させる。
When working in special needs education, I had the opportunity to work with students who could not speak. I witnessed firsthand their intense expressions of emotion and realized the communicative power of the human touch. Touch most directly manifests “existence.” Of the five senses, it is the quickest to develop; babies touch and lick everything they encounter and thereby first learn about the world around them. Touch is density, weight, warmth, even existence itself. These elements cohabit my mindscape, mingling and interacting. And from there, a “lump of feelings” tumbles out.
Clay is formed from weathered granite rock. An exposure to air, sunlight, snow, and rain breaks down the rocks surface slowly and continually and eventually decomposed into clay. A few years ago, my interest in clay guided me to pick up a book on ceramics by the author of one of my art school textbooks. In it, I came across a description of how granite from the Rokko mountains to Shigaraki formed our ceramic clay. Seeing this book brought me back to my student days when the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake hit my hometown and granite rock had protected my home from destruction. The connection between the material I had been using in my work and that which was beneath my feet all my life struck me deeply.
In this series, I have fired rocks and clay together. This stems from my interest in textures and in the transformations that occur when firing materials that share the same origin. Rocks twist, crack and melt under extreme heat, changing their form during firing. In contrast, clay is soft and plastic. Flames give it the unique hardness and lustrous shine of the ceramic surface. By joining rock and clay into a single form and firing it together, we witness “fracturing” and “chipping” phenomena. While these have held a negative image within traditional ceramics, “repairing” them has brought forth positive impressions, in turn elevating the “damaged” pieces’ value. Lacquer is traditionally used in “Japanese KINTSUGI, or gold repair,” but I have used mica and re-fired the pieces to give them permanence in gold.
Animals(’15-
Fruits(’14-
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Exhibition Views
Card / Poster
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Homes(’14-)
Flowers
A lump of Feelings(-’14)
A Garden of Feelings
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Show case
The private
Pink -micro- world (Student works)
