No fancy canvases to paint on for this artist. Takahiro Iwasaki, a Japanese artist, makes do with everyday objects to express his creativity. Born in Hiroshima, Japan, he has made the city of his birth his workplace.
If you look at Iwasaki’s works, you will find in the common household items, such as bookmarks, duct tapes, toothbrushes, towels, and the like. Using these banal objects, he creates works of art that include pylons, cranes, landscapes, and what have you. Sample his towers made from towel threads atop randomly stacked towels that portray pylons on the mountains or the cranes made out of bookmarks placed on books. All these represent Japan’s rapid industrialization.
In his Reflection Model series, Iwasaki even constructs precise wooden 3D Japanese architectures. In this, he sculpts temples in Japanese cypress and places an inverted version underneath it to give the effect of reflection on the water. The whole sculpture is suspended in midair. This work was displayed at the Gallery Natsuka in Tokyo, Japan.
In most of his works, Iwasaki portrays the transformation of his city of birth, Hiroshima, after it was destroyed by an atomic bomb. It depicts the trauma of war. However, in his works, he transforms this city from the center of military operations into a City of Peace.
Iwasaki decided to pursue arts and got himself enrolled in Hiroshima City University in Hiroshima, Japan. From here, he did a Bachelor of Arts in Arts, Master in Arts, and a Doctor of Philosophy. He also earned a Master of Fine Arts degree from the Edinburg College of Art, the University of Edinburg in Edinburg, UK.
