The central part of the artwork shows the amalgamation of two pieces of ready-made fabric. It has been carefully handwoven with the warp threads extracted from the two kinds of ready-made fabric. In the 19th century, the rapid modernisation took place in Japan after the country broke out of the relative isolation and began trading with European countries that were far more advanced in terms of science and technology. The admiration for the advanced Western science soon resulted in the rejection of its own culture in Japan. The radical transformation had a profound impact in a way that Japanese people have been scarred with a sense of inferiority ever since. Simultaneously, the majority of cultural heritage prior to the modernisation was long forgotten due to the proliferation of the Western imports. It can be said, therefore, that Japan does not have the foundation for contemporary art because what the word “art” encompasses in the context of contemporary art is fundamentally the derivative of the Western culture. Accepting the rupture of the cultural lineage, I decided to embrace the cultural hybridisation between the West and the East in order to create something new, upon that which is neither original nor firmly fixed.

The original version (2005) was submitted to the well-known art competition in Japan, “VOCA 2005.” Although it was meant to be a painting competition, as I was unable to accept the idea of canvas as a given, I made this work, posing a question as to the rather unsteady foundation upon which Japanese contemporary art was constructed.