Iku-ta: Living Field,  2017

72 x 54 inches. Jacquard woven fabric. Cotton, polyester, rayon. 

Traditional Japanese textiles are full of auspicious symbolism. Written in Chinese characters, my surname, Ikuta, means “living rice fields,” connoting my ancestral origins of rice farmers in which nurturing and caring were essential qualities for their livelihood. In Iku-ta: Living Field, I embedded my wishes for future generations of my family to return to the original values of this name, to reestablish familial love and nurture in a group where such ideas have become hardened and industrialized.