Sacco Fujishima
Mono, Permanent Wall Intervention, 2016
The landscapes that I depict are usually from industrial areas in Japan. Which are derived from my own memories of the scenery of the small town I visited as a child. If you have ever seen a large industrial plant, be it a cement factory, a petrochemical complex, or a steel works, you were probably shocked at their tremendous scale. These buildings are unique to this machine-age civilization and can be found all over the world. However, the number of factories have been decreasing in the past several years throughout Japan. I create these landscapes as a homage to this era and as a gift to posterity. Shinto is an ancient religion of Japan and is based on the worship of kami, which roughly translates to 'spirits'. These spirits exist as elements of forces in nature that live within everything; from animals, plants, stones, and mountains to buildings, kitchens, sinks, or even just a single grain of rice. Shinto gods are collectively called yaoyorozu no kami, an expression literally meaning "eight million kami" but interpreted as meaning "myriad" or "many Kami". The colors you see express only a part of the myriad of 'spirits'. Do such spiritual powers also pervade machine-scapes and industrial complexes? Could it be that the emotions that I feel being around these factories and buildings in metropolitan areas are in fact spirits? Which brings the question, are these spirits natural or man-made?
