When I visited my friend’s house in Bern, the capital of Switzerland, I found a mysterious piece of art hanging on the dining room wall. However, upon closer inspection, I realized it was not a painting, but a simple wooden tray. According to my friend, this is not an art piece, but a functional device that can be used as a tray when needed.
However, when I stare at the tray, I feel a strange feeling. Perhaps because trays are made with the assumption that something will be placed on them, when I look at the tray, I perceive a vector of load perpendicular to the bottom plate of the tray, and I can see a glass that has been toppled over, a coffee cup, and water and coffee that are trying to escape from them. I was happy that my heart and imagination were working, and I could see something invisible, so I spoke to my friend. This is a work of art!
So I thought of a title for the piece together with my friend. My friend suggested “Waiting.” It certainly was a good title. The empty tray was waiting for guests, hot tea to be poured on it, and for a pleasant afternoon of conversation. As I was looking at the tray, I suddenly smelled the aroma of delicious cookies baking.
This is a site-specific installation in an Old Machiya House in Kyoto. I use architecture as a traveling device to explore “Infinity Space”.
Gion Konishi, a former teahouse, has a narrow frontage and deep interior, as is typical of Machiya houses in Kyoto. The light from the front slips through the lattice, slides over the Ajiro carpet passes through the many layers of lead screen doors, and slowly blends with the quiet light in the back garden. When one sits in the back tatami room and looks towards the street, the scenery leading to the Higashiyama Mountains unfolds like a cinema. Architecture is a traveling device. Shoji and sliding doors suggest rooms and layers of time and space extend to the Oku depth. I installed blue light into the depths of the Machiya space and created the endless flow of time. I dreamed of the light of the future overlapping the shadow of memory.
At the Exhibition, Ikuko Konishi’s flower arrangement was installed in the gallery space, A picture scroll with the ancient Gion Festival Memory was installed in the Toko picture alcove.
