-
The Aluminium Garden- Structural Studies of Plants-love grass
-
Year: 2022
Medium: Aluminum foil (0.2mm, mirror polished surface)
Dimensions: 100 x 50 x 35 cm (39 3/8 x 19 5/8 x 13 3/4 in.)
Acquired from rin art association, 2022
As the series subtitle “Structural Studies of Plants” suggests, Mitsuya begins by studying the structure of the plant he has chosen as his motif. He creates flat patterns in aluminum foil from which the form of the plant can be built, then shapes them into three-dimensional structures. Aluminum foil can be compressed and modeled like clay, rolled into tubes to form relatively rigid rods, or cut like paper into sharply defined forms. This work takes as its subject a species of lovegrass native to South Africa. Its leaves and stems grow long and slender, and in summer it bears flower heads resembling ears of rice. Rendering such delicate forms in aluminum foil is far from easy. Mitsuya’s approach appears devoted above all to accurately capturing the plant’s structural features, much like a botanical study. The plant, meticulously analyzed and reconstructed through Mitsuya’s observational eye, conveys neither its color nor its scent. Yet precisely because this faithful rendering is made from aluminum foil, a material that feels so strikingly incongruous, the plant itself may be imagined all the more vividly.
