Taichi Hara, an art major at University of the Ozarks, will present his Senior Art Exhibit, Origami in Focus, in the University’s Stephens Gallery from April 8-12.
Hara’s senior project incorporates the Japanese art of origami with photography.
“My artwork combines the use of origami and photography to show scenes of my life,” he said. “I create small to medium size origami pieces and place them into a background. These backgrounds can be nature settings in either America or Japan or a photograph of places I have visited. Origami is the Japanese art of paper folding — from ori meaning ‘folding” and kami meaning ‘paper.’ The origami pieces represent Japanese culture combined with American culture to show the mixing of the two which represents my experience. I take photographs to capture and share stories from my childhood.”
Hara said he had not done any origami recently until he was in Professor Green’s Sculpture class, when he decided to make an origami chicken from several folded origami pieces into a larger sculpture.
“The main themes for my photographs are animals, memories, and the duality of culture,” he said. “I picked animals like frogs, dogs, foxes, and birds because of how they fit into the nature setting. Some memories are when I went on vacation to Washington D.C., riding the trains in Japan, and enjoying the cherry blossoms in my home country. The duality of cultures is shown by incorporating my culture into places on my college campus, as well as around town. In several of the photographs, you will see buildings from the University of the Ozarks campus. This conceptual art represents origami as real things in everyday life.”
Hana said his artwork, Golden Pheasant, shows his overall theme.
“The origami animal is a golden pheasant which is called ‘kinei’ in Japanese,” he said. “The bird is mostly a gold color which symbolizes an important color in Japanese art and how it is used in temples. The colors also represent the look of this bird. The white feathers match the white flowers on the pear tree which reminds me of cherry blossoms in Japan. Taking this photograph with my origami art in a tree in Clarksville shows the duality of culture.”
Hara was born in Gifu Ogaki Hayashi in Japan. He is scheduled to graduate in May with a major in art and minors in psychology and communication. Last month, he received honorable mention for his photographs in the River Valley Arts Center Collegiate Art Competition.
Topics: Art