ontakesan memorial 2014

Takahashi Atsuko & Tamás Szvet  : Ontakesan Memorial / ikebana, stone, handmade rope from handmade mino washi paper / installation /20x30x300cm / 2014

This work created during the MINO-AIR artist in residence program in Mino city in 2014. Since the early eight century, the area of Mino has been one of the most famous paper production places in Japan. During the residency I used locally produced paper and learned traditional techniques to create my installation exhibited in the Mino-Washi Museum.

The installation is cooperation with Takahashi Atsuko san. She arranged the ikebana for the work. As The Book of Tea explain:  The first flower arrangement created by “ those early Buddhist saints who gathered the flowers strewn by the storm and, in their infinite solicitude for all living things, placed them in vessels of water.” *

Above the flower arrangement, a five kilogram stone hangs on handmade paper rope. The braid created by Tamás Szvet, who learned the technique from the elderly of Mino city, and used locally produced handmade paper by Hidekazu Ishihara.

The work stands as a memorial. On the 27^th of September in 2014, the volcanic mountain Ontake exploded, and buries several people whom were near bye. Stones were falling from the sky, size as used in my installation. We would like to remember to those whom lost whit this memorial sculptor.

* Kakuzō Okakura: The Book of Tea (New York: Putnam's, 1906) 

MINO AIR - Paper Art Village Project 2014 / Mino City, Gifu Prefecture / JP

Photo: Fumiko Otsuka