A Process of Deconstruction – Modern Remains by Takeuchi Kouzo

Taking a hammer to a piece of work that you’ve slaved over is often counter productive, but Takeuchi Kouzo has put this ideology to good use in this series titled ‘Modern Remains’. It’s quite interesting how even as kids there’s something quite therapeutic about destruction, we often play and deconstruction is a major part of this process, but as we grow older we seem to associate ruin and decay as a bad thing. As Takeuchi quotes in this great short film, “In the profession of ceramics a broken piece indicates failure. However, I try to enhance the beauty of a piece by breaking it.”

The video below created by Keiko Art International shows Kouzo’s process from start to finish. First, he casts the form in moulds and then joins them together before glazing and sanding. After the first firing he goes through a process of deconstruction, hammering the forms to express the distinctive ambience of the decayed buildings in his work.

Interestingly his inspiration came when he dropped a piece of sculpture by accident. After pondering he realised the beauty in these broken pieces, and this is how the Modern Remains series came in to being. I really like the abstract thinking that he’s had to go through to create these, looking at something from a different perspective, alongside the link to architecture and time that passes. Hopefully you do too and will be inspired by this video and imagery below.

keikoartinternational.com

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