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(c) 2016 Minori Yamazaki -Japanese Artist-


by ardest

"Wishing to Make Art Works Express the wonder of Sense and Life"

"Wishing to Make Art Works Express the wonder of Sense and Life"

"It is hard to tell where we should place Minori yamazaki's words in the path of modern arts.
\"Wishing to Make Art Works Express the wonder of Sense and Life\"_a0031847_14261611.jpg

He creates spaces which involve us. With his technique of communication though all of the five senses he is attempting to reach for newer horizon in art."

The Search for Free Expression

In my school years, I majored in molding art crafts, and I was in the midst of tradition. Making traditional crafts though dozens of processes, made me wonder if these processes meant anything significant to our daily activities.1 couldn't help feeling there was something more real in the primary materials such as clay, straw, or charcoal, in the ancient wisdom of treating water and fire, in a structure of molding through the complicated and mysterious processes, and in the way of metal melting into the smooth and shining liquid. I was more interested in a sort of animism, in other words, the way materials and space presented themselves to me.

There was a time when I was so overwhelmed with the magical power of the things themselves that I couldn't mold anything at all. It was about then that I became involved in performance art and eventually moved into the modern arts, with the burning of wood by heated iron. But it was not long after that I realized that the concept of expanding space could not be adequately expressed by the phenomena of burning.

In the late 1970s, the Asahi newspaper carried a serial column entitled "Asobi-no-Hakubutsushi (The Play Museum Journal)," written by lwao Sakane. Ginza Matsuzakaya Department Store created an area called "Asobi-no-Hakubutsukan (The Play Museum)," which attracted a record number of visitors.

It seemed to me that this represented a medium between the two accepted extremes of "commercial design", and "art for art's sake," containing the elements of play while welcoming various expressions of art. We were impressed by this interactive open space for the public, which was created using various visual techniques, like optical tricks, illusions or computerized display technology. We couldn't help but feeling new possibilities for better designs and wider boundaries of expression.


From Micra BOX to Micra Space

The start point of my current activities was in a tiny box "CUMOS" which I made while ignoring the required subjects during my freshman year in college. I placed mirrors on the inside panels of a cube box with 10cm sides and let in a small ray of light. The light could not escape from the box, repeating its reflection inside, creating an illusion of an infinite number of nesting boxes. It was a kind of three-dimensional kaleidoscope.

This box allowed only one person at a time to view the image. Interesting it was, it was itself limited. Naturally, I wanted to take out "macro space" from "micro box" and expand macro space to a huge lighting space which would allow people to enter and experience it from the inside. I was fascinated by the light and primary materials of this inner world of CUMOS.

In 1988, I participated in the inauguration ceremony for the Tokyo Branch of the Koyasan temple. I created "Mandala Pavilion", which was inspired by the doctrines of esoteric Buddhism and its mandala charts depicting two worlds, Taizo and Kongo. This led me to design the Taizo dome and the Kongo pyramid. The spherical Taizo dome is filled with soothing light to represent a mother's womb filled Buddha's love. I made the dome with relaxing light and comfortable music and fashioned it to slowly swell and shrink. The inner space was designed so that people could share an image which gave the feeling of expanding from the interior of the womb to the end of the universe. In Kongo, I tried to express the hard ascetic practices and the spiritual awakening of satori.

I buried the monitors under grids in the floor and made the image of satori by repeating reflections on the insides of the pyramid's ceiling, all four of which were covered with mirrors. It was a visualized space of the virtual image through which I tried to make visitors simply feel the cosmology and the complexity of Stinging Buddhism. I have to admit that I was surprised to learn that CUMOS' nesting box shared the ideas of Buddhism, cycle of reincarnation, and the concept that micro existence contains macro universe.

Spaces that Move

I attended the birth of each of my three daughters through the Lamaze technique. I wanted to see the moment when a human being is born into the world and I wanted to express this experience through spatial art.

I created "Conception of Light" for the 100th anniversary of Sendai City in 1989, and I presented "Emanation of Light," the exhibition in Sumida River-side Gallery in 1992.

Through these works I had the opportunity to express the mixture of charm, magical strength, and the wonder of life. Using various electronic techniques, I built spaces and installed the controlling system which gave the illusion of breathing spaces. However, techniques are just techniques. In "Back to the Womb" and "The Memory of the Fetus", my theme was to express the feeling of an entire world which nobody had ever seen. If we could just trace back to our potential and hidden memories, we could then imagine what that space would be like and try to visualize it.

My role is to provide visitors with the opportunity to take note of the wonder of life and to contemplate self-existence and the universal theme of living things. I have always believed that I should continue to create spaces which communicate feelings that will move and touch people, keeping in mind the concepts of design, the arts, and the realities of modern society.

Minori Yamazaki   April 1995

 Minori Yamazaki's Internet Museum  ヤマザキミノリのインターネット美術館 Internet Museum of MINORI YAMAZAKI

■ cubic 3D kaleidscope = mirror box 鏡箱 サイコロ型万華鏡 CUMOS
■ new CUMOS site CUMOS cubic cosmos scope ]
■ 万華鏡伝導 UAPふくろうの会
 
e-mail= minori.yamazaki※gmail.com (※の部分を@に変えて下さい)
by ardest | 2005-03-21 00:54 | about MinoriYamazaki