September 4 – October 2: Junko Maruyama: Diving in through the Wall
Exhibition:
Junko Maruyama: Diving in through the Wall
September 4 – October 2, Th, Fr & Sa 14:00-18:00 (except Sep 4)
Commencement: Saturday, September 4, 19:00-21:00
Body moves. Weather shifts. I go with the flow and leave the traces.
I made soap from used oil collected from various restaurants, the leftover which once supported our lives. I drew a picture outside with it. The rain washed it away. I drew again. With the process, I tried to capture the dialogs between material and environment, functionality and non-functionality, permanence and impermanence.
Some scientists say if human creates a life-form, it would begin with a piece of soap. I made creatures with the soap I made. They are sculpture-like, and yet drawing-like, holding various traces—of gaining forms, of evolution that is yet to see. I call them “Manonamanamono”. The name suggests something raw and ephemeral, created or emerged at the time at the place. Between the traces, I see a dialog of organic and inorganic matter.
I move with soap and leave the traces.
Born in Japan, Junko Maruyama currently lives and works in Berlin. Having studied sculpture in the City University of New York, Hunter Collage, the artist works across various medias such as drawing, sculpture, installation, performance and animation. Her works examines the notions of circulation and rebirth, often recycled materials, in particular fluid and variable materials such as ice cream, plastics and soap. By circulating the different states of matters of materials, the artist explores the existence and non-existence of the borders in between.
She has shown her works in various exhibitions such as Alive and (Gallery Paris, Yokohama) 2021; A Story Begins from Flowers and the Sea (Kodomo Museum, Chiba) 2020; Bunkamura Gallery Selection (Bunkamura Gallery, Tokyo) 2019; Re: (F1969, Busan) 2018; Echigo Tsumari Art Triennale (Hoshitouge, Niigata) 2015, 2006; 5 rooms (Kanagawa prefectural Hall Gallery, Kanagawa) 2016, among many. Her notable awards and achievements include Free Art Free Semi-Grand Prix, Charitable Trust Oki Memorial Artist Grant, Taipei/Yokohama Artist Exchange Program Judge Special Award, Asahi Shimbun Cultural Foundation Grant, and Arts and Culture grant from Nomura Foundation.
She is currently working at Künstlerhaus Bethanien for international residency program, with the support by Overseas Study Program for Artists Fellow, Agency for Cultural Affairs, Government of Japan.
Titled Maintenance! Domestics as Institutional Becomings, acknowledging the work of Mierle Laderman Ukeles, our series of solo exhibitions and online events for the next months will address the domestic from different vantage points related to institution-making. We are preparing a reader on the topic that will be launched soon as well. During this new program of exhibitions, the previous interventions will remain at TIER. In that way we’ll keep working on the space as an editorial device to be renegotiated, and an ecology of artworks, underlining its conception as an inner garden based on principles of cultivation.
Photos by Benjamin Busch
