Year: 2022
Medium: naphthalene, mixed media (cast from Tozan Kiln's plaster mold)
Dimensions: 28 x 40 x 30 cm (11 x 15 3/4 x 11 7/8 in.)
Acquired from Mizuma Art Gallery, 2022
Miyanaga’s parents’ home in Kyoto is the renowned “Miyanaga Tozan Kiln”, where numerous ceramic artists, including Kitaoji Rosanjin, have fired their works. Miyanaga reused the molds for ceramic carving that were actuallyused at the Tozan Kiln to create a series of works including this work, which was shown at her solo exhibition “valley of sleeping sea” (Mizuma Art Gallery, Tokyo, 2022). There is naturally a space inside the mold. This space was originally intended to represent ceramic clay in shape, but it had been forgotten for many years until Miyanaga turned her attention to it again. Miyanaga creates sculptures with naphthalene, a substance that loses its shape easily. That is why in that old mold which had been neglected for a long time, Miyanaga must have seen the shadow of a ceramic sculpture as if it had been sleeping like sediment. “Valley” likely refers to the inside of the mold. Since the work is “valley of sleeping sky” embodied by naphthalene, it is not only the form of the past ceramic sculpture but also the “absence” itself that has been sleeping there. The appearance of the reclining tiger will eventually dissipate and disappear as sublimation progresses gradually. However, as long as it is sealed inside the glass case, what was once a tiger will sleep again and continue to exist there at all times.
