“Hasutaro – Growth, Memory, and Rebirth”

In producing works, Tamada makes the skeleton first, then adds the fleshy parts, and finally covers them with skin or hide. In the process, she changes the state of the cardboard by peeling strips off to get paper, crumpling such paper, and working it into a clay-like condition. This process is also an exploration of ways in which cardboard as a material can be altered. Tamada's works are not painted or colored at all; they are complicated interweavings of layers of various brown hues, and the joints and seams are left exposed. This technique breeds a distinctive texture, and the finished work has the strength of a wooden sculpture. The figures so formed that appear before our eyes transcend the ideas and preconceptions associated with the word "cardboard." As powerful statements of Tamada's outlook on life, these creations of hers have a unique presence and fascination.
As noted above, in making art, Tamada deconstructs and changes the material instead of using it as is. She says that, for her, this is also the creation of beings, as if she were ensouling the works under the concept of a "new rebirth." For the works in this exhibition, she superimposed the theme on her own life and produced the "Hasutaro" series inspired by her experience of child-raising and children's stories. In so doing, she took up the challenge of a new round of artistic expression with cardboard. This "Hasutaro" series springs from the artists belief that the lotus ("hasu") has a bigger flower if its roots lie in thicker mud. At the same time, the rebirth of used cardboard in the form of living creatures hints at relations with the cycles of life and ecosystems, and with contemporary civilization. We urge all to come and see the narrative of growth, memory, and rebirth as embodied in Tamada's "Hasutaro" series.