Event period: 2023 December 9th (Sat) - December 14th (Thu)
Location: Tor Gallery 1F
This is my 20th solo exhibition in Kobe. 13 years ago, I was searching for a venue for my solo exhibition, going from Kyoto to Osaka to Kobe, and I ended up in Kobe. For me, who had held solo exhibitions in Yokohama, Kobe was a place I felt at home in no time. Perhaps because it is a port city, I still remember feeling the openness to new things and the generosity of people who welcomed outsiders.
For the past few years, I have been displaying my works in book-shaped frames. I feel like I have been able to pursue this method of displaying my works, so next year I would like to think of new ways to display them.
My solo exhibition in Kobe in December 2023 ended, and I personally felt a strange mixture of satisfaction and emptiness. I am truly grateful to all the customers who came, and I am so moved that I don't know how to express it. At the same time, to be honest, I began to have doubts that the experience I had gained over the past 20 times, or what I thought I had always been accumulating, had not actually been accumulated. Perhaps I had become a little dependent on my customers. I strongly felt that I needed to make my works/exhibitions more and more attractive, and that I would feel sorry for my customers and the materials I was using. I will use the materials with a stronger sense of responsibility and a clearer will, and sublimate them into my works. In a sense, it was my 20th solo exhibition in Kobe, where I was able to return to my roots. Thank you very much to everyone who came. How much you all have saved me. I will continue to work hard on my creations, remembering your faces/existence. And actually, I may take a break from Kobe next year.