「静寂」
「雲の上の山水」
Dedication to Kennin-ji: Japanese Sanctuary “Silence” and “Landscape Above the Clouds” – Artistic Intent
The work Japanese Sanctuary, dedicated by Naoko Tosa to Kennin-ji Temple, is far more than a mere digital expression of “Japanese beauty.” According to the temple’s records, the work is described as an expression of the “stillness” and “dynamism” rooted in Zen and Shinto, consisting of two distinct pieces: Silence and Landscape Above the Clouds.
Silence centers on a 200-year-old mochinoki (holly tree) that once stretched diagonally across the Kennin-ji garden. The tree collapsed under heavy snow a few years ago and no longer exists. Consequently, this work does not simply document lost nature; it is an attempt to re-invoke the time, memory, and presence of that vanished tree within the sacred space of Kennin-ji.
Conversely, Landscape Above the Clouds is a sansui (landscape) composed of over 1,000 photographs of clouds taken from an airplane, representing Heaven, Purgatory, and Hell from right to left. Here, the landscape is not cited as a traditional ink-wash icon. Instead, the sansui is newly generated through a modern vantage point, a moving body, and perception from the air.
Tosa does not cite Japanese culture as a set of static icons. Rather, she reconstructs stillness, disappearance, presence, the temporality of the afterlife, and the spatiality of sansui as structures of emergence. It is noteworthy that digital technology in Japanese Sanctuary is used not to showcase futurism or novelty, but to facilitate a re-experience of lost nature and the memories of a religious space.
If Sound of Ikebana is a work that extracts fleeting forms invisible to the naked eye through sound, then Silence is a work that re-establishes the existence of a lost tree within stillness. Landscape Above the Clouds does not “draw” a landscape; it creates the conditions under which a landscape is born through clouds, movement, and perspective.
Therefore, the core of this dedication can be stated as follows: Naoko Tosa uses modern technology to re-generate the invisible structures of time and spirituality inherent in Japanese culture. In this sense, Japanese Sanctuary is a significant work that expands Tosa’s theme of “emergence” from natural phenomena into the realms of Japanese culture, spirituality, and temple space. It is not a reproduction of tradition, but a work that creates the conditions for tradition to manifest once again.