Alison King PSG :: Marika Komori
Picking up Marbles with Chop Sticks
Alison King
As an A level Art student, Marika Komori sought to connect with her Japanese roots and family. While teaching her textiles at this time, I was working on my "Flying Chinese Dolls" for the PSG exhibition "Not What It Seams" at the Bankfield Museum in Halifax in 2005. Marika’s wonderful research on Chinese costume and embroidery were an inspiration to us both and I remain enthralled by much of what I found in Chinese culture for both visual and personal reasons.
I had always struggled to eat with chop sticks and one afternoon she told me how her father had taught her to practise using them to pick up marbles. This seemingly impossible task left an abiding impression on me and I love the different levels at which this lesson can be interpreted.
In my piece "Picking up Marbles with Chop Sticks", inspired by this experience, I have endeavoured to combine my lifelong love of the Scottish landscape with my view of the woods at Glengairn and my passion for Chinese embroidery.
Behind the illustration of a seemingly frivolous exchange, however, lies a much more important message – the joy and fun to be found in the classroom and the essential two-way nature of the teacher/ student relationship.
A Fold in the Traditional
Marika Komori
I developed a keen interest in Textiles when I was taught for four years by Alison King and as a result of that I am in my final year studying Textile Design at art college in Dundee. I studied Japanese Design and the Kimono with Alison as an A Level student and because of my Japanese roots I have formed a great love and fascination for traditional Japanese design and I had a strong desire to take this interest further.
Following a visit to Japan in 2007, my piece looks at images of Japan painted in a traditional style but constructed through textiles in a way which reflects the structures and forms seen in many Japanese designs such as the Kimono, Origami and the traditional Japanese Kasa, (Umbrellas). Inspiration comes too from the symbolism of the paper cranes that I found in the Hiroshima Memorial Park. My piece also reflects how much I have learnt as Alison King’s student and how I have loved being able to share my knowledge of Eastern Design and build a close friendship between student and teacher.
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