ART LIVES TORIDE Where Art Is Born

Usually I create works combining iron and junk such as bicycles. I go to the metalworking workshop at the Toride Campus of Tokyo University of the Arts every day. As I always work with metalworking, I am dependent on the machines and equipment, so it is an indispensable place for me to work. The works I create are exhibited on the university campus, and in recent years, I have also exhibited large-scale works in Tokyo and other cities in the region.

Basically, I spend every day of my life thinking about my work. Even on days when I don’t go to the university, I work on orders, do drawings, and get qualifications to create large works of art (……). I also eat a lot, move around a lot, and live a healthy life. I sleep a lot in order to store energy for production.
While living in Toride and doing research, I found it meaningful to create works using bicycles, so recently I have been continuing a series of works using them.

The material for this series is abandoned bicycles. Not only bicycles abandoned on the streets, but also those that are left unattended and exposed to the elements under the eaves of houses, which I call “domestic” abandoned bicycles.
In order to use them as material for my work, I first went door to door in Omonma, the area where the university is located. Later, when I needed a large number of bicycles, the Toride municipal office supported me.

 
 

“Kaitensuru Fuzai (Roating Absence)” (2020),Photo: Ikuya Takahashi

The work will be exhibited at the “Echigo-Tsumari Art Triennale 2021” (the work will be permanently installed for 10 years). I am very much looking forward to being able to practice the process of creating artworks while engaging with local people in other regions such as Niigata, as I did with the collection of abandoned bicycles in Toride, and to presenting my artwork creation, which started in a small region, on an international stage.
Because of the coronavirus pandemic, I am now in a situation where I cannot even present my work without presenting it online or in the form of data, but because I have experienced such an era, I have realized once again that I am not satisfied unless I create my work with my hands. I want to give it my all.
In this day and age, it has become commonplace to create or produce something in order to live.
I, myself whose heart was set on becoming an artist, don’t know how to live without art.First of all, until I am satisfied, I want to continue my artistic activities to the best of my ability, somehow eking out a living by creating artworks.