Subject: Motoi
Yamamoto
Returning to the
Sea
Motoi Yamamato is a world renowned artist who class Japan his
native home. He was born in Onomichi, Hiroshima, JAPAN in 1966 and received his
BA from Kanazawa College of Art in 1995. Yamamoto
has exhibited his award-winning creations around the globe in such cities as
Athens, Cologne, Jerusalem, Mexico City, Seoul, Tokyo, and Toulouse. He was
awarded the Philip Morris Art Award in 2002 as well as the Pollock-Krasner
Foundation Grant in 2003. (1)
A
contemporary artist, he’s known for his inclusion of salt in the works he
produces. Interviews with Yamamoto help to understand the ideas behind his art.
He began creating art with salt while mourning the death of his sister. This is
was in effort to keep memories of her alive. (2)
Author
Mark Kurlansky of the Halsey Institute of Contemporary Art states that Yamamoto
views his own installations as exercises that
are at once futile yet necessary to his healing. My reason for choosing this
artist has to do with the installation aspect of Yamamoto’s work and the
dismantling of it at the end where he delivers the salt back to the water,
usually in collaboration with the public. (1)
“Hundred
Labyrinths”
salt
13.5 x 8.2 m
Hundred Stories About Love
21th Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa, Japan
April - August, 2009
In Japanese culture salt is
not only a necessary element to sustain human life, but it is also a symbol of
purification. He uses salt in loose form to create intricate labyrinth patterns
on the gallery floor or in baked brick form to construct large interior
structures. As with the labyrinths and innavigable passageways, Motoi views his
installations as exercises which are at once futile yet necessary to his
healing. (1)
Labyrinth
wood, acrylic cokor, marker pen
200×300×24 mm
"Solo Exhibition - Drwing-", Casumi, Kanagawa
LABYRINTH
salt size : 5.7×7m Oct. 2004 OPENING EXHIBITION 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa [The Encounters in the 21st Century : Polyphony - Emerging Resonances] |
||
Salt is a ubiquitous commodity, as it is found
in all of the oceans of the world, and virtually all cultures use some variant
of it in their diet. What began as an exploration of the practices of
Japanese death culture and its use of salt has now become a more philosophical
enquiry into the importance of this substance to life on the planet. He
likes to think that the salt he uses might have been a life-sustaining
substance for some creature. Yamamoto is interested in the
interconnectedness of all living things and the fact that salt is something
shared by all. For this reason, when his salt-works must be disassembled,
he requests that the salt in his installation be returned to the ocean. (1)
(3) From sketching to the real deal:
Labyrinth
glass, matt film, marker pen
220×350×25 mm
"Solo Exhibition - Drwing-", Casumi, Kanagawa
LABYRINTH
salt
size : 8m×4m
Solo Exhibition : Gallery K2, Kanazawa, Ishikawa
May. 2001
According
to the artist, “ Drawing a labyrinth with salt is like following a trace of my
memory. Memories seem to change and vanish as time goes by. However, what I
seek is the way in which I can touch a precious moment in my memories that
cannot be attained through pictures or writings. I always silently follow the
trace, that is controlled as well as uncontrolled from the start point after I
have completed it.” (1)
References:
(1) Yamamoto, Motoi, Mark Sloan, and Mark
Kurlansky. Return to the Sea:
Saltworks
by Motoi Yamamoto.
Charleston, SC: Halsey Institute of Contemporary Art, 2012. Print.
(2) Yamamoto, Motoi. "Motoi Yamamoto
"Salt Installation, Artist"" Motoi
Yamamoto
"Salt Installation, Artist" Motoi
Yamamoto, n.d. Web. 04 Mar. 2015.
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