Tomoko Konoike’s recent practice resembles that of an animal attempting to return from civilization to the wilderness. In recent years, we have been confronted by a series of natural disasters, while the nuclear crisis following the Great East Japan Earthquake revealed our entanglement with the invisible world of radiation, forcing us to reconsider the very act of seeing. Sensing a profound shift in the relationship between the human body and the earth, Konoike suspended her previous mode of production and embarked on journeys through rural communities, gathering stories that had been pushed to the margins and moving deliberately beyond the boundaries of art.
Now, with a new needle and thread, she has begun stitching paintings that become “animal skins.” For human beings, to create objects and sustain life is, in a sense, to act against nature—a form of fundamental violence. Marking Konoike’s first major solo exhibition in the Tokyo metropolitan area in six years, this exhibition confronts that violence directly and invites visitors to reflect on one of art’s most fundamental questions: why do human beings create?