Preferences

People usually have their own standards of perfection and different preferences for what they want their work to look like. These feelings are cultivated in each individual person and differ between each person. 

One artist, upon bringing her work into the recent exhibition, decided that she wanted to make some changes to her work. She was comparing her work to the work of other artists in the gallery and her standards of perfection seemed to change. She decided that she did not like the texture of her work as it was, so used sandpaper to sand it down again. 

There is a feeling that the work that we have seen in this exhibition is striving to be perfect. Each artist has their own idea about perfection. Even if ‘perfect’ does not really exist in the art world, these artists do their best to make their artwork as close to their standard of perfection as possible. This level of effort is apparent in their work and makes the art more wonderful. If we make small changes to our work when needed, then we can be satisfied with the work when it is completed.

Tanslated by Jennie Whittington

Kyoto ZUIHODO’s Commitment - Tools

When creating artworks, are the tools not important? Of course the artist’s commitment and spirit and protecting traditional techniques is important too, but you cannot create artwork without tools.

For the creators, tools are not merely objects used to make things. They are passed down from generation to generation, and are important objects filled with meaning.

There are many types of tools according to different patterns and processes, and many tools may be used to create one work. Artists must choose the right tools for the process they are using and the pattern they are creating.

Techniques which can only be created using certain tools have been handed down from the past to now.