1999 Kamiyama Artist in Residence Participant
In Kamiyama from October 5 to November 17 1999

Born in Kagoshima in 1951. Influenced by his grandfather, he started to carve wood from the third grade in elementary school. He continued his carving work as he worked as a computer technician. He finally began to totally devote himself to wood carving in 1976. He received the Eighth Nagoya Carving Award in 1986 and Modern Japan Carving Festival Award in 1988. He also began to receive attention as a sculptor. He received the Asahikawa Wood Carving Award in 1996, and his works were exhibited as “Modern Wood Carving – Soh Kurowarabi Exhibition” at Abashiri City Museum in 1999. As a sculptor of wood, he commands great respect.
“Ordinary Life,” which is a theme of his early works is expressed through carving old jeans or mittens. Yet these works do not possess physical bodies, they give a strong impression of the power of life. Recently his works center around the theme of “reality” and “the future,” such as garbage problems, environmental pollution, the abundance of food, and social consumption. These works cause us to think about the relationship between modern society and humanity.

The ark has on it a quite life-like wooden made shoe, crushed can, and half-bitten apple; which represent modern social problems like garbage problems, the abundance of food, and society’s tendency not to recycle. On the other hand, this ark plays the role of a time capsule which has inside it children’s hope, dreams, and so on. This is certainly a modern “Noah’s Ark” and it has been causing us to think about the direction of our future.