Miki Okazaki
I have loved drawing pictures since I was a child, and I thought I was going to be involved in art. However, when I entered an art high school, I was unsure of what I wanted to paint while everyone around me was getting better and better.
At that time, my grandfather, who was living with me in Okayama, invited me to go to the Setouchi Triennale. I think he just wanted to go out with his grandchild. I learned there that there were other ways to be involved in the festival, such as managing and supporting the festival, and that becoming an artist was not the only way to work with art and art work. I felt a glimmer of hope.
When I read a book on art projects, as a high school student, I had no idea what it was about. The only thing that came easily to me was an interview with Hiroshi Fuji. I entered Akita University of Art because Mr. Fuji was a professor there and I wanted to go to the art university furthest away from my hometown, Okayama.
When I actually went there, I had a sense of being liberated. Rather than being fully involved in the art project, I enjoyed creating my own works and club activities. I joined a club that organized events with local residents while creating paintings until the summer in my 3rd year. I would gather people who wanted to have their birthdays celebrated. My time in Akita was pure fun.
At the university, I was told to keep digging into things I was interested in, and I began researching tumulus. I found that some tumuluses that were built to show power are now places for people to gather and relax. The fact that the place was being treated regardless of the original intention somehow made me feel hopeful. Based on that I wanted to create a work related to graves, and I started by drawing them. However, I could not convey what I wanted to do at all. I felt like there was a limit to my drawing.
When I learned about a burial method called “crouched burial,” in which people are buried with their legs folded, I was very interested in the part about dying in the same position as a fetus before birth. I dug a hole and recorded myself being buried on film. Rather than making a video work, I wanted to be buried and experience it. I wanted to record it in a pure vein. The work was made by showing only the scene of being buried.
I created video works that I would ask the person to tell me about things that were important to him or her but have been lost, and then we would go looking for them together. I also made a work in which I asked for memories that were important to the person, but that they might have forgotten, and I cast a spell on them so that they would not forget.
I guess I am interested in the idea of disappearing or being gone. There was a time when I clearly realized that I was going to die. If I die, then everyone around me dies. I remember being very despairing about that. Like grave and caregiving, I wondered how I could sublimate such loneliness and sadness, as well as having someone to tell a story, going to find a grave together, or writing a letter. I would like to think of ceremony like a funeral, or a process together with someone.
I often make videos, write texts, and do readings, but to be honest, I am very embarrassed to perform myself. But I ought to do it. I want to know while hearing and experiencing at first hand. I want to experience it. Although I want to hide myself, I always think about all the things that I have to present myself in my work.
I am now taking a leave of absence from graduate school to continue interviewing people I met during my days of the club activities in Akita. There was a couple who were good friends of mine, and the husband passed away. The wife seemed to be having a hard time for a while, but one day she suddenly started keeping a tortoise. It seemed to me that the tortoise started to move her time.
I don’t know how it will turn out yet, but I really feel like I have to do this. The more I hear about it, the more I feel like it’s something I shouldn’t retrace my steps.
When I am in Ibaraki, I also work as an intern for Toride Art Project. I enjoy meeting and getting involved with many people through my activities. I think that if I don’t meet people, I may stop creating. I get nervous when I first meet people, but I would like to meet and listen to all kinds of people.
