Since around 2011, I have been observing the wrinkles and folds of clothing once worn by someone else, hand carving this image from a lump of clay, and transferring the memory of the clothing to ceramic to create works of art. Clothing is the most intimate part of the human body and is closely connected to the inner life of its owner. The wrinkles, folds, and deformations of a garment carry the memory of its former owner's body and soul.
In everyday life, the cloth itself that forms the garment changes constantly, never staying the same. On the other hand, ceramic, when fired at high temperature, undergoes chemical changes in its composition and retains its given form until it breaks into pieces and is reduced to grains of sand again. While studying the characteristics of the material and firing process of ceramic, I have come to realize that ceramic has the ability to retain its given form.
I believe that ceramic has the property of being a "memory medium" by retaining its given form.
From the cloud system of our modern world to printing, lettering, and sculptures carved in stone, "memory media" has always existed in various forms. What, then, is the significance of ceramic as a "memory medium"?
The rough texture and the cracks of fired ceramic possess a strong feeling that awakens my physical senses of touch. The garments, which are made of cloth and bear traces of their owners' lives, are continuously flowing and changing with the wind, and when I carve them into clay by hand, that is as if I am simultaneously weaving my own physicality and time together with the memories of these people. These ceramic clothes created from this sensation and awareness contains various feelings that are incorporated during the hand carving process. They become a form of multi-layered memory that is different in quality from mere reproductions.
Nowadays, we are surrounded by a huge amount of information on a daily basis, and our own existence seems diluted, and I express an unconscious desire to establish the subtle sensations that form the core of our existence into something tactile and solid. Ceramic (clay) is one of the most fundamental materials to create by our own hands some kind of structure that relates to the world.