Aoki: Life, Death and Transformation

The artist role is to investigate some specific concepts in their local culture about the world with symbols and different materials. They try to communicate the idea with an expressive way through a piece of symbolic artwork, of which various media is explored and used, including those most common objects we can see such as wool, feathers, cotton, etc. Their ideas are simplified as mysterious symbols and patterns, which combine together become something aesthetic that attract people’s eyes. At the same time, they are the vehicle that embody and represent the concept, floating around the weird figures and sculptures.

The artwork is the bridge connecting the supernatural world with the human’s world by putting mythological creatures on ceremonial objects like the mask used by people. With the wish of “transforming into supernatural beings” with the ceremonial objects, people actually made those pieces for completing a part of their religious activity. In this way, viewers are also able to understand the people’s idea about the supernatural world by investigating the religion and culture. When looking at the symbolic patterns and forms come from different mythologies, we are demonstrated visually about the local culture and history.

The context is the “indigenous cultures of the Americas”, in terms of “the concepts of life, death and transformation”. Basically it is about how the American people explored and interpreted the most enduring concepts about the life and death cycle.

The concept of the artwork is to demonstrate the “interrelated” relationship between those three concepts. They connect with each other, go after each other and circulate with each other, which are never ended and always the biggest mystery that people want to know about the answer to it.