LINGUA FRANCA: Chiharu Shiota (1972-) Japanese Yarn Installation Artist / based in Berlin

Back to inspiration mode... ! DUH!

I encountered Chiharu's work when I was visiting the 56th edition Venice Biennale this summer. After seeing a number of subtle and elegant works from the other countries, the dramatic and almost explosive network of red yarn inside the Japanese pavilion has well shocked me. The theme of the exhibition is "The Key in the Hand", created by Chiharu and curated by Hitoshi Nakano.

Chiharu Shiota

Chiharu is a Berlin-based artist and often creates large-scale installations by stretching yarn across the exhibition space, and produces works out of materials that are filled with memories and traces of everyday life such as dresses, beds, shoes, and suitcases. She is notable for her skilled approach to the large installation format, which has become a special feature of the biennale in recent years. But Shiota's choice of materials and the spatial structure of her installations maintains a sense of preeminent beauty without losing any freshness of power, quietly permeating (遍布) our minds and bodies. Shiota's work, which transcends linguistic, cultural, and historical contexts as well as political and social circumstances, and deeply affects viewers from all over the world, has been presented and esteemed (尊敬) in approximately 200 exhibitions in Japan and other countries throughout the West, Middle East, Oceania and Asia.

After being confronted with the deaths of several intimate friends and family in recent years, Shiota has converted these experiences into the Lingua Franca of pure and sublime art without averting (避免) her eyes from the reality that all human beings must face "life" and "death" but that each of us must do so individually. At times, Shiota's work conveys a sense of the "darkness" that is inevitably contained in the "unknown world" associated with death and uncertainty. Even today, four years after the Great East Japan Earthquake, it is conceivable (可以想像) that viewers from various countries visiting a large international exhibition like the Venice Biennale will be overwhelmed by the "dark" parks of her work due to its associations with a country that has suffered deep physical and spiritual wounds. In Shiota's work, however, there is a powerful "light" of hope and spiritual brightness that dwells deep within the darkness. This is a light that is inherent not only in the tremendous anxiety that plagues (瘟疫) Japanese people but in the precarious (危險的) state of things all over the world.

In Shiota's exhibition at the Venice Biennale, she integrates the gallery, located on what is essentially the second floor, and the outdoor piolotis on the first floor of the Japanese Pavilion. Upon entering the gallery, viewers will find a space filled with red yarn. Attached to the end of each piece of yarn, suspended from the ceiling, will be a key. In our daily lives, keys protect valuable things like our houses, assets, and personal safety, and we use them while embracing them in the warmth of our hands. By coming into contact with people's warmth on a daily basis, the keys accumulate countless, multi-layered memories that dwell within us. Then at a certain point we entrust the keys, packed with memories, to others who we trust to look after the things that are important to us. In this work, Shiota will incorporate keys as a medium that conveys our true feelings.

Moreover, she will place two boats on the floor beneath the yarn and the hanging keys. The boats symbolize two hands catching a rain of memories (i.e. countless keys) pouring down from the ceiling. While struggling and working with the hands, the two boats will move forward through a huge sea of memory as they collect individual memories. Along with a large box located outside among the piolotis that will be used to display a photograph of a child holding a key in the palms of her hands, four monitors will show videos of small children taking about memories from before and immediately after they were born. By listening to them recounting memories from the time of their birth and looking at keys containing an accumulation of memories, we will experience two different phases of memory in the spaces. Prompted by the exhibition, we will discover memories contained within us, some of which will unfold and stay with us, and help us to form links with other people.

There is actually the statement I copied word by word from Chiharu's website. By typing every single thought of hers I believe I may get better understanding of her exquisite mind. No talking, see the images below!

Installation "The Key in the Hand", Japanese Pavilion, 56th Venice Biennale

Let me give a more throughout honorable mention to Chiharu for her amazing works. Chiharu is a Japanese performance and installation artist. She stuidied at Kyoto Seika University, Canberra School of Art, and Berlin University of the Arts with Marina Abramovic and Rebecca Horn. Her work has been presented at the Mattress Factory (Pittsburgh 2013), Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery (United Kingdom, 2012), National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo (2007), Nueu Nationalgalerie (Berlin, 2006), and MoMA PS1 (New York City, 2003), as well as the Biennials in Venice, Fukuoka, and Yokohama. Born in Osaka, Japan in 1972, Shiota currently lives and works in Berlin.

I have listed out some recent exhibition by Shiota below, have a look ;)