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Paper short abstract:

(Artist Talk) A Japanese visual artist reflects on her own work and thinking about environmental and community based art, showing examples of large scale sculptures and a work in progress in a small fishing village. 

Paper long abstract:

I trained first as an architect and then at the Slade School of Art in London and have exhibited my large scale sculptures in major Japanese art exhibitions, as well as overseas. I often work with driftwood and make pieces that are affected by the elements and disintegrate with time. I have a particular interest in working with communities, listening to their stories, trying to understand their histories and to express locality and community in my work. I will present some examples of my site-based work and talk around the ideas of making sustainable art, rooted in community, history and place. I will discuss the interplay between art and community and art and the environment. Some of my ideas challenge the expectations of the larger festivals, which are often male-dominated and not receptive to art works that break down and vanish with time. I will talk about art as a different form of memory, the fragility of art in relation to environmental and community fragility. As a case study I will talk about a piece that I created in the 29th UBE biennale, international sculpture competition inspired by undersea mines in Ube City, Yamaguchi Prefecture. The piece is located in Tokiwa park which was built over an Edo period coal mine. There is now a lake there that was dug during the Edo period as a reservoir for agriculture. There  are underwater mines  in the sea near this park, at least one of which is now flooded. The Park and the sculpture competition were started by the director of undersea mines, the original industry in Ube. My work attempts to express the existence of the mine workers at that time through the physical movement of digging coal with pickaxes and is inspired by the undersea mines in the area. I will also talk about another project I am preparing, to create a sculpture in a remote fishing village on Sado Island.