2025 Expo Osaka: Kimono Sashes Damaged in Noto Reborn as Art; Joint Project Depicts Phoenix, Dragon with Ishikawa Materials
An object created by collecting kimono sashes that could no longer be stored after the disasters including the Noto Peninsula Earthquake, on display in Osaka, on Monday.
'Horyu,' an art piece created by collecting kimono sashes damaged in the Noto Peninsula Earthquake and Okunoto torrential rains last year, was unveiled in front of the Expo Hall Shining Hat at the 2025 Osaka-Kansai Expo on Monday.
Standing 3 meters high and 1.8 meters wide, it depicts the wings of a phoenix and the belly of a dragon. Soil and wood from a collapsed house in Wajima, Ishikawa Prefecture, were placed inside to express the artist's wish to overcome hardship and move toward reconstruction.
The project was a collaborative effort organized in part by stage director Hiroaki Omote, who also directed the kagura performance on the day, and Tsutomu Shinohara, president of a Kanazawa-based non-profit organization, the Japan kimono culture promotion association.
Fifty sashes were used from approximately 5,500 kimonos and sashes donated by quake victims. Omote oversaw design, and Minoru Ishikawa, a Kagawa Prefectural traditional craftsman, sewed the cut sashes.
The exhibit was on display only on Monday. Visitors stopped to take pictures while admiring the craftwork. 'The desire that everyone wants to revitalize Noto together pours out of the work,' said Yoshie Benno, 75, from Neyagawa, Osaka Prefecture.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yomiuri Shimbun
2 hours ago
- Yomiuri Shimbun
2025 Expo Osaka: Digitally Re-Created Hiroshima Artifacts Displayed at Expo; Artists' Sculptures Link Past Tragedy to Vision for Future
Digitally crafted re-creations of items that belonged to victims of the Hiroshima atomic bombing are on display at the 2025 Osaka–Kansai Expo. A pocket watch 30 centimeters wide, 30 centimeters deep and 60 centimeters high, and a fountain pen 20 centimeters wide, 20 centimeters deep and 60 centimeters high, were created by New York–based artist Cannon Hersey, 48, and Tokyo-based artist Akira Fujimoto, 49. Hersey is the grandson of Pulitzer Prize-winning author John Hersey, whose 1946 book 'Hiroshima' revealed the devastation to the and Fujimoto believe that the Expo's vision of the future cannot be separated from the past, and they hope the installation will help keep memories of the bombing alive. Since 2019, the pair have produced artwork using 3-D data from artifacts held by the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. Pasona Group Inc. proposed a new commission last autumn for its pavilion at the Expo, and Hersey accepted, saying it would be meaningful to exhibit at an event visited by so many people. The artifacts were photographed at high resolution early this year, and 3D data were used in a Toyama Prefecture studio to craft the sculptures. Aluminum casts made from 3D-printed molds were hand-polished to reproduce fine details, and each piece was enlarged for easier pocket watch's hands are frozen at 8:15 a.m. — the moment the bomb was dropped — and its dial is melted inward. The fountain pen, discovered in Noboricho near the hypocenter, has a snapped nib, vividly conveying the force of the blast. Fujimoto chose the pocket watch because 'the atomic bombing can be said to have stopped the flow of time; by seeing the hands fixed at 8:15, people can sense the time that was lost.' Hersey selected the fountain pen as a symbol capable of influencing society. The artists visited the Pasona pavilion for the first time on Tuesday. Hersey remarked that without understanding the past, a better future cannot be created. 'Visitors from all over the world will come to the Expo,' said Yoshifumi Ishida, director of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. 'These highly precise works give people a meaningful opportunity to consider and empathize with the damage caused by the atomic bomb.' After the Expo ends in October, the sculptures will be exhibited in Hiroshima City. The Pasona pavilion — whose displays also include life-science innovations such as sheet-shaped cardiac muscle grown from iPS cells — accepts advance reservations, though visitors may also enter by lining up on-site.
Yomiuri Shimbun
5 hours ago
- Yomiuri Shimbun
Tech Company CEO Resigns after Controversy over Video Captured at Coldplay Concert
The IT company CEO captured in a widely circulated video showing him embracing an employee at a Coldplay concert has resigned. Andy Byron resigned from his job as CEO of Cincinnati-based Astronomer Inc., according to a statement posted on LinkedIn by the company Saturday. 'Astronomer is committed to the values and culture that have guided us since our founding. Our leaders are expected to set the standard in both conduct and accountability, and recently, that standard was not met,' the company said in its post on LinkedIn. The move comes a day after the company said that Byron had been placed on leave and the board of directors had launched a formal investigation into the jumbotron incident, which went viral. A company spokesman later confirmed in a statement to AP that it was Byron and Astronomer chief people officer Kristin Cabot in the video. The short video clip shows Byron and Cabot as captured on the jumbotron at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Massachusetts, during a Coldplay concert on Wednesday. Lead singer Chris Martin asked the cameras to scan the crowd for his 'Jumbotron Song,' when he sings a few lines about the people the camera lands on. 'Either they're having an affair or they're just very shy,' he joked. Internet sleuths identified the man as the chief executive officer of a U.S.-based company and the woman as its chief people officer. Pete DeJoy, Astronomer's cofounder and chief product officer, has been tapped as interim CEO while the company conducts a search for Byron's successor. Most concert venues warn attendees that they can be filmed It's easy to miss, but most concert venues have signs informing the audience that they could be filmed during the event. Look for them on the walls when you arrive and around the bar areas or toilets. It's common practice especially when bands like to use performances for music videos or concert films. The venue in this case, Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, also has a privacy policy online which states: 'When you visit our location or attend or participate in an event at our location, we may capture your image, voice and/or likeness, including through the use of CCTV cameras and/or when we film or photograph you in a public location.' Once captured, a moment can be shared widely 'They probably would have got away with it if they hadn't reacted,' said Alison Taylor, a clinical associate professor at New York University's Stern School of Business. And by the time the alleged identities emerged on social media, it hit a classic nerve around 'leaders acting like the rules don't apply to them,' she added. Still, Taylor and others stress how quickly such a video lead to an internet search to find the people involved — and note that it's important to remember that such 'doxing' isn't just reserved for famous people. Beyond someone simply spotting a familiar face and spreading the word, technological advances, such as the rising adoption of artificial intelligence, has made it easier and faster overall to find just about anyone in a viral video today. 'It's a little bit unsettling how easily we can be identified with biometrics, how our faces are online, how social media can track us — and how the internet has gone from being a place of interaction, to a gigantic surveillance system,' said Mary Angela Bock, an associate professor in the University of Texas at Austin's School of Journalism and Media. 'When you think about it, we are being surveilled by our social media. They're tracking us in exchange for entertaining us.'
Yomiuri Shimbun
18 hours ago
- Yomiuri Shimbun
Kyoani Arson Victim's Picture Book to Become Anime Series; Former Colleagues Aim to Carry on Creator's Legacy
KYOTO — Friends and former colleagues of Yoshiji Kigami, an animator who died in the July 2019 arson attack at a Kyoto animation studio, are pushing ahead with a plan to turn a children's book he wrote into an anime series. The project intends to carry on the legacy of Kigami, who was determined to create works 'that touch the hearts of children.' Kigami was 61 when he died in the blaze at the studio of Kyoto Animation Co., or KyoAni. 'Kigami was a genius. There was nothing he couldn't draw,' said Toshiyuki Honda, an animator at Tokyo-based anime production company Ekura Animal. 'Even now when I start on a new project, I wonder how he would have drawn it.' In 1982, Honda, Kigami and several others established the company that would eventually become Ekura Animal. Kigami also wrote a picture book titled, 'Small Jam and Opp the Goblin.' Published in 1989, the book tells the tale of an apprentice magician boy called Jam who grows as a person while he considers 'what courage really is' during his interactions with a goblin named Opp. In the postscript, Kigami wrote that he 'made it a point to create works that broaden children's dreams.' The company considered turning the story into an anime, and Kigami created manuscripts for seven sequels and prepared sketches for the project. However, Kigami moved to KyoAni in 1991 and plans for the anime faded away. After Kigami's death in the attack, Honda reached out to animators and other contacts in the industry. They worked together to create a 17-minute anime film version of the book, which was completed in 2024. The credits named Kigami as the work's original author. Kigami's wife and mother conveyed their thanks to the production team for including his name. Honda and Ekura Animal employees are now planning to create a new anime series based on the book and manuscripts Kigami wrote, along with original stories they created. Honda, 74, has asked individuals and companies in Japan and overseas for donations to help cover production costs. 'I hope we can make anime in which the children watching will feel friendship and compassion,' Honda said.
