A trilogy about Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Fukushima, expressingthoughts about life.
What we need now—isn’t it a hymn to life? It connects what people have left behind with their lives to the future, imbuing a ray of hope and prayers.
I painted this in hope that you feel the importance of life, especially now.
Since 2013, I have been visiting a farm in Fukushima Prefecture that was exposed to radiation after the 2011 nuclear power plant accident. I witnessed weakening and dying cows and horses and learned about the rancher’s deep sadness and strong anger. I began to make ranches a theme of my works, while expressingthe importance of life by drawing animals.
The piece on the right, Ranch, Release, depicts various animals with prayers and visions. My previous works were dark monochrome, depicting ranches as “sites of tragedy.” As time passed, my mindset changed: “Let’s paint a picture of hope. Let’s turn death into life.”
For the middle piece, River of Time, Sway, I toured Hiroshima and interviewed local people. Alongside Hiroshima’s Atomic Bomb Dome and the Memorial Cathedral for World Peace, a young girl exposed to radiation stands thinking about the future. Behind all these, Pegasus, a symbol of immortality, powerfully flies into the sky even though being injured.
In Sky, Rise, which depicts Nagasaki, a phoenix, made up of the bodies of various animals, rises out of the fire toward UrakamiCathedral, which was destroyed by the atomic bomb and later rebuilt.
I created wrinkles and cracks by wetting and pasting Japanese paper together and rubbing and scraping ink and paint on them, thinking of battered and maimed animals, people and the city. I envisioned the screen covered with countless wrinkles to be the folds and traces of suffering of animals. The size is meant to represent “the size of life,” and the amorphous shape implies “living organisms complexly connected.”
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「牧場 放（はなつ）」
「刻（とき）の川 揺（ゆれる）」
「天空 昇（のぼる）」三部作
広島と長崎、福島を題材として「命」への思いを込めた三部作。
命への賛歌こそ、今必要なのではないか。人々が命をかけて残してきたものを未来へとつなぎ、希望の光や祈りを込めた。
今だからこそ、命の大切さを感じてほしいと描いた。
私は二〇一一年原発事故で被ばくした福島県の牧場に一三年から通い、弱って死んでいく牛や馬を目の当たりにし、
牧場主の深い悲しみや強い怒りを知った。牧場を制作のテーマにするようになり、動物たちを描くことで命の重みを表現してきた。
右側の「牧場 放（はなつ）」は、さまざまな動物を祈りと理想を込めて描いた。
それまでの作品は、牧場を「悲劇の場所」ととらえ、暗いモノクロームだった。
時が経過し「希望を描こう。死を生に反転させよう」と心象が変わった。
真ん中の作品「刻（とき）の川 揺（ゆれる）」は、
広島をめぐり、地元の人と話しながら取材をした。
広島の原爆ドームや世界平和記念聖堂などが並び、被ばくした少女が未来を思いながら立つ向こうで、
不死の象徴であるペガサス（天馬）が傷つきながらも力強く空をかける。
長崎を描いた「天空 昇（のぼる）」は原爆投下で破壊され、後に再建された浦上天主堂に向かって、
いろいろな動物の体が組み合わさった不死鳥が火の中から飛び立つ。
和紙をぬらして貼り合わせ、墨や絵の具をこすって削り、しわや亀裂が生じる手法で、ぼろぼろに傷つけられた動物、
人、街に自分の心を重ねた。無数のしわに覆われた画面は動物たちが負った苦しみのひだ、痕跡のようにと思い描いた。
大きさには、「命の大きさ」を表したいと、不定形には「複雑に結び付いている生命有機体」という意味を込めている。
TRILOGY
Ranch, Release
River of Time, Sway
Sky, Rise
A trilogy about Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Fukushima, expressingthoughts about life.
What we need now—isn’t it a hymn to life? It connects what people have left behind with their lives to the future, imbuing a ray of hope and prayers.
I painted this in hope that you feel the importance of life, especially now.
Since 2013, I have been visiting a farm in Fukushima Prefecture that was exposed to radiation after the 2011 nuclear power plant accident. I witnessed weakening and dying cows and horses and learned about the rancher’s deep sadness and strong anger. I began to make ranches a theme of my works, while expressingthe importance of life by drawing animals.
The piece on the right, Ranch, Release, depicts various animals with prayers and visions. My previous works were dark monochrome, depicting ranches as “sites of tragedy.” As time passed, my mindset changed: “Let’s paint a picture of hope. Let’s turn death into life.”
For the middle piece, River of Time, Sway, I toured Hiroshima and interviewed local people. Alongside Hiroshima’s Atomic Bomb Dome and the Memorial Cathedral for World Peace, a young girl exposed to radiation stands thinking about the future. Behind all these, Pegasus, a symbol of immortality, powerfully flies into the sky even though being injured.
In Sky, Rise, which depicts Nagasaki, a phoenix, made up of the bodies of various animals, rises out of the fire toward UrakamiCathedral, which was destroyed by the atomic bomb and later rebuilt.
I created wrinkles and cracks by wetting and pasting Japanese paper together and rubbing and scraping ink and paint on them, thinking of battered and maimed animals, people and the city. I envisioned the screen covered with countless wrinkles to be the folds and traces of suffering of animals. The size is meant to represent “the size of life,” and the amorphous shape implies “living organisms complexly connected.”
(英訳・松永京子氏)