YOD Gallery is pleased to announce the exhibition, “Shape of Life”, by Aya Murata (b. 1979) and Sayaka Shingu (b.1979) which will be held from 27th October and 17th November 2012.

Both Murata and Shingu, born in Kyoto and Osaka in the Kansai area, develop daring representation of abstract ceramics that are decoratively detailed in the feminine sense. They used to share the same studio with others and had exchanged their skills and expressions in being aware of each other. They distinctively express their inner thoughts in the nature of human and their individuality in their pursuit of representing ceramics with their common feature and differences.

The point in common between their executions is a result of expressing “life” in organic forms like flowers, plants and corals. The foundation of representing ceramics is prior to precede medium and skills, starting with restrictions, such as firing and pottery. Therefore, they are unable to choose mediums previously as a means to express themselves. It can be said that they executed a work in a form of flowers at the beginning as a result from the process of touching, crumpling and kneading clay.

While Murata expresses ever-changing feeler like organic forms in the use of the colourful skill of “Nerikomi (Slabs of different clays coloured with stains are pressed into logs, sliced, and arranged to form)”, Shingu executes works in monotone with petals and many narrow and needle-like pistils and stamens. They seem to be elegant and flowery as it appears to be, but Murata actually represents luridness with unique patterns in the vivid colours and Shingu seizes a sense of decay and mortality with the fragile form in the monotone colour.

Murata’s luridness means human’s “greed”, “jealousy”, “envy” and “ambition”. She refers the luridness as attraction for human that feeds life to grow up by expressing the sense in the organic form like sea creatures. On the other hand, Shingu conceptualise to make grotesque things, which is by no means beautiful in time-decaying, look as pretty as possible by her skills that she has disciplined by herself. Shingu also considers the monotone as a way to get rid of excess and to project her self in her works. The clear difference between their presentations of “life” is that Murata captures the flow of time as “growth” turning towards up and Shingu seizes it as the sense of “decay” seems falling down.

In the process of the exhibition, “Shape of Life”, they have developed more their own distinctive abstraction and concepts by clarifying their own consciousness to their executions in the close comparison. We would like you to experience works that both Murata and Shingu represent small and large works with their own sense to “life” in the installation.