hikari, 2023
installation (scroll down for more info)
Paper handmade by artisans in Echizen, Japan (Iwano, Nishino, Heizaburo III, Murata, Yamaguchi, Kitaro), glass prisms, light
Hikari means “light” in Japanese. This installation invited viewers to use glass prisms to draw with light atop handmade papers made by Iwano, Nishino, Heizaburo III, Murata, Yamaguchi, and Kitaro, in the Echizen papermaking region (also where this gallery is located). Light pours through this former storehouse-turned-gallery in the morning and afternoon, creating ideal conditions for this activity. Many viewers were the makers themselves, or their families, or other craftspeople. Other viewers from outside the village enjoyed making rainbows and other shapes with the prisms.
This room encapsulated much of what makes Echizen and the surrounding community special: it brought people together, to look at the papers of other makers and their neighbors; it enabled viewers to simulate the experience of “inspecting” finished sheets of paper in nearby paper mills, and; it provided a means to appreciate the labor and love that goes into the craft.
This installation was shown at the current Mi-Lab Mokuhanga Innovation Residency, formerly the Yamatoya Gallery (Japan). Related installations, ura and omote, are considered related artworks and were shown at the same place and time.