Hisako SEKIJIMA BASKETRY

Hisako SEKIJIMA
BASKETRY

関島 寿子 | バスケタリー

20 April - 7 May 2018

Hisako SEKIJIMA will join us on 20 - 22 April
10:00 - 18:00
closed on Tuesday

#635〈組・織の間 -虚 Ⅱ 〉クルミ
Structural Discussion – negative space Ⅱ, walnut

“Binding and connecting fibers can be considered as the first technology of mankind. At the technological level there is no difference between the Neolithic age and our own times. I am living a normal life in a large city. In my garden I sow seeds, wait for 10 years, cut branches from the walnut tree and peel the bark to use it as raw material. To have a relationship with the material of my work from its very origin increases my joy, makes my thinking more versatile and stimulates my creative awareness.”

“Baskets are really wonderful tools for life. But I am more intrigued to explore their shape as a container of emptiness and the logic of the gaps and intervals, that build their shape. These negative spaces and their structure show abstract beauty, which holds something very appealing to me. I enjoy meditating about material, structure and form and analysing their relationships. And this joy increases year by year.”

関島寿子|HISAKO SEKIJIMA
was born in 1944. After studying English literature and learning traditional rattan basketry for several years in Tokyo, she moved to New York in 1975. The museums and collections in New York gave her the opportunity to study the weaving traditions of numerous cultures. Her encounters with the avant-garde of modern basket makers in the States (Ed Rossbach, John McQueen) inspired her, to start her own, very distinct journey as an artist of modern basketry. Now Sekijima works and lives in Yokohama.

#601〈変位 Ⅱ 〉コウゾ
New Phase Ⅱ, kôzo

“In this work I have tried to expand the realm of basketry  through a qualitative change of the texture of the raw material, without relying on construction principles. The bark of the paper mulberry (kôzo) is often used for washi (Japanese hand made paper) and for tapa, a barkcloth on the Polynesian islands. I beat the bark until it becomes soft as a piece of cloth and wrap it around eight corners to enfold a small hollow firmly and thickly.”

“When you analyse how basketry is done, you will find six basic operations: looping, knotting, coiling, plaiting, weaving, twining. None of them is special. All  are quiet normal daily practices, like tying one’s shoes. If you just follow this practice, or in other words, if you forget all the names and rules about baskets, that people have given them over time, then basket making becomes really free and flexible.”

#609〈反発の和 Ⅳ〉オカメザサ
Resilience Ⅳ, okamezasa

#628〈空の枝 Ⅰ 〉クワ
Hollowed Branches Ⅰ, mulberry