Statement
日本語

When I look back on both the process and results of my artmaking, it’s clear to me that I am not especially motivated by issues such as expressing the beauty of glass as a material, or in exploring the sophistication of form itself. I’m not attracted to things that are perceived as being beautiful at a glance. The reasons I have continued in this medium have more to do with the visual sensations and experiences I gained from learning glassmaking techniques. This is especially true with my approach to combining plaster and glass.

Plaster and glass are mutually dependent during the process of glass casting, but plaster is traditionally used as the material for creating a mold, and not evident in the finished piece. I became interested in the relationship between the two materials after opening the electric kiln after firing a glass mold piece and seeing the brittle fragility of the plaster after having been subjected to extreme heat, coupled with the mysterious strength of the glass. I was further intrigued when a
piece I had created using a mold had cooled after the mold had broken due to the mass of the glass I was using. This led me to look at the materials from the opposite perspective, and I came to the realization that it was very important for me to express that balance of fragility and incompleteness in my work. From that point on I began using plaster as a mold which I could then put glass inside of and explore the phenomenon of creating textures and changes in light and shadow through the relationship between these two materials.

Then in 2017 after many years of devoting myself to this method of creating work, I received some advice which caused me to consider going back to glass as a material in and of itself in the form of glass blowing, a technique which I hadn’t used since college. I changed my relationship to glass by using discarded pieces, or commercially made glass bottles as raw materials, and was also inspired by the process of glass blowing. Hence, there were more ideas in my work that are traditionally associated with glass, such as emphasis on form and curves, and my initial inspiration for expressing fragility and incompleteness at the same time as a concept expanded to include such considerations. 

My work now is created from both clear, and semi-opaque colored glass together. I think about how light or shadow fills the work through the relationships between different glasses and other materials, but have also been intrigued by the idea of a glass container. A container that holds air and light, where shadows are reflected off of plaster. This new approach is different from the initial accidental experience in the kiln which caused me to invert my thinking about the relationship of materials. It is the result of my own continued experimentation and attempts to reverse direction in my own work. Another reason I use the container format is because it directly connects to my understanding of existence. It is expressed in the dual notion of both wrapping around from outside, and also of being wrapped around from within. I am attempting to express that state of fragility and impermanence in my work.