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Once, I saw a butterfly sunning on a stone step, its wings open like a face. As I watched, it slowly folded its wings until only a thin, black line remained.

My clay sculptures spring from a conviction that forms carry emotional and psychological meaning. These shapes waver between human and nonhuman, figure and landscape, and reflect my particular connection to the natural world. The patterns of my life mirror those of the animals, plants and the moon, and sometimes, it feels like there are no boundaries at all.

This sense of wonderment sparked my interest in old stories, especially Japanese ghost stories, where humans and animals mutate freely. These are a direct inspiration for my work.

Although I make sculptural objects, I often think in picture planes like a painter. I build primarily from clay slabs, drawing cut-lines directly onto the clay so that these drawings themselves become the sculpture. Clay can be both clean or messy; it can be constructed elegantly like architecture, or poked and prodded in sticky lumps. It embodies my contradictory sense of both inhabiting my body and being outside it.

Narahashi means oak bridge in Japanese.

Narahashi means oak bridge in Japanese.

 

Gorky's Granddaughter "Keiko Narahashi, Dec 2012". Online video interview. Gorky's Granddaughter Official Site <https://vimeo.com/56129519>