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Pattern has always been an essential element of art, but when you combine pattern with cutting, the results become endless. So far I haven’t come across anything grandiose as the tapestries of Tomoko Shioyasu, who takes huge sheets of synthetic paper and carefully and repeatedly cuts away at it. Using utility knives and soldering irons, she meticulously chisels the paper until she creates intricately carved patterns and designs of Tantric magnitude. If you look closely, you’ll notice a natural rhythm and flow to her work, the amount of detail in her incredible pieces are astounding. Every tiny paper cut move rhythmically back and forth catching the eye and gradually pull you into it’s every inch.

SCAI The Bathhouse on  Shioyasu’s last exhibition:

“The little cuts accumulate to create works on a very large scale, producing installations which take in the flow of air and light of their location, becoming one with it so that the exhibition space becomes an abstraction of nature itself, and the installation becomes a sign of nature with presence and depth….In the installation space, the spirit of nature flows through her work, giving the impression of a vivid dance by the air and the particles of light. In a sense, in cutting pieces out of two-dimensional paper, Shioyasu is using thin air as a material and chiseling a new form of sculpture out of the space itself, gaining insights into what things are really like.” 

Shioyasu art takes inspiration from rocks, trees, water channels and cells, focusing on the essence and roots of life in its most basic form. As a student, Shioyasu was fascinated by the veins in the leaves of Rumex japonicus found all over campus. The veins were so delicate, yet had such dynamic forms, and she once tried cutting them out one by one with a utility knife. She describes this as the inspiration behind her current works, created on the theme of “nature,” and falling into three categories: cutting works, which she creates with fine, overlapping cuts in large, wide sheets of paper using utility knives, soldering-iron works, in which she creates images by melting holes in special synthetic paper, and drawings, using acrylics or charcoal. Common to each of these approaches is a significant amount of delicate and repetitive work performed by hand.

Through nature, Shioyasu is expressing a world-view of pursuing the truth of the universe, an approach that is shared with Zen and other forms of Buddhism. In the installation space, the spirit of nature flows through her work, giving the impression of a vivid dance by the air and the particles of light. In a sense, in cutting pieces out of two-dimensional paper, Shioyasu is using thin air as a material and chiseling a new form of sculpture out of the space itself, gaining insights into what things are really like. Shioyasu is attempting to create a new space through a strong and energetic image of life―life that wells up with enough energy to be heard, life that is sublimating and recycling― conveying insights about something that seems to be truly important. (SCAI The Bathhouse)

Here are some of Shioyasu’s works from her past show “Cutting Insights”:

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