On My Art 1
- History of My Art(2007)
After graduating, I thought about the identity of my art and at the same time I wanted to study international contemporary art. I left Japan to explore contemporary art with my own eyes in 1981, at 27 years old. The main destination of the trip was Europe, plus I also traveled to the United States and Israel. I used all my time to get acquainted with art museums and art galleries in different countries at the beginning of the trip. I was excited to see the world's top art with my own eyes. But my enthusiasm was gradually lost. All the art works I saw became normal. After a couple of years I realized that in this way I would not find the art I was looking for. I should look for what I should do. From that "enlightenment" I found my way and at the same time knew it would not be easy. During my study trip I had visited Finland for three summers. I fell in love with Finnish nature and people. I felt part of Finland. At the end of my voyage in 1984, when I was 30, I decided to stay in Finland. Since then I have lived and worked in Finland until the present day. My artistic activity
so far can be divided into two periods, early period and main period.
When I arrived in Finland, I started creating a series called "Beginning".
The series could be described as a quiet, secret and warm forest / mushroom
landscape, I really want to say; spiritual landscape. At the same time,
I started a series called "The Time of Roses", which is also
a quiet, secret and fascinating flower series. These two series were followed
by a series called "The Holy Tree" and the series "The
Tree of Life". The main period began when I was 40 years old in 1994. In this period, I was fascinated by human figures, especially pair characters like mother and child, woman and man. At first I did not know what I should do after the baby had appeared in the Tree of Life. I felt like I had already done what I wanted to do. There was emptiness inside me. One day I took some clay in my hand, but I molded it a small crouching female figure and then standing female figure, was born of clay. Then came the idea of Madonna with a little boy inside. I made standing figure of Madonna with little boy inside. I immediately felt (almost heard a snap) that everything was completely right in this theme. That's how the "mother and child" series started. I came to understand why there are so many mother and child statues. The artist becomes part of the work, he assumes the role of the chosen son or son protecting the mother. I felt really good at doing Madonna. "I am the chosen son." "I am the mother." The next topic was
a woman and a man. One might think that the boy has grown up and the mother
has changed into a young woman. In my sculptures a man and a woman belong
together. They have a same body. When I was doing this theme, I realized
and felt that the wife was not only the object of love, but also the partner
of life. We go our way together by helping each other. It may sound like
a quite normal thing. But it seems that the thing went deeper and even
deepened my own marriage. |