Tōsai
Photos © Amelie Blanc
The project is a series of sculptures that is inspired by traditional Japanese
bonsai art. This is a plant (usually a small planted pine tree) in order to imitate a large
natural tree the size of a model. The bonsai requires great technical care, time and
control of its climate. Raising a bonsai requires extensive knowledge without which
it would wilt. The bonsai seems to me to be both a perfection of art requiring much
human control and a representation of an idealized form of tree. My Tōsai project
would oppose the practical side of the bonsai. Tōsai is a word I coined by combining
the characters tô 陶, meaning ceramics and sai 栽, meaning the plant or plantation.
In the first stage I achieve the same form sculptures. Then these forms will be bisque
fired. Secondly, the entire series are glazed with one or more different glazes but each
time with the same amount. Despite their identical shapes, they will be deformed
during high temperature firing, giving each piece different forms (unique) sculpted
and defined by chance. The series, Tōsai will be completed with accidents and a loss of
control. The Tōsai series will resemble plants that sprout and give life while in the kiln.
Between the kiln, the glaze, the clay and the artist, who exactly is the creator of Tōsai?
This is derived from a desire to create organic forms using technology and ceramic
sciences. Particularly, it is this ambiguity that interests me.