There are lots of saltpans around the Otani district in Suzu. The artist felt a profound connection between her surname (formed from the Chinese characters for “salt” and “field”) and the place, and chose as the venue for her work a former nursery on the hill overlooking the sea. She created a work, inspired by an anecdote of one Kikutaro Kakuhana; he had received orders from his superior to protect salt production in his hometown during the WWII instead of being sent to the battlefield, hence passing down the precious method of salt making. By stretching through a space countless red threads from a salt-collecting boat that had been once in actual use, she spun the memory and history of those engaged with the agehama-style salt production, Japan’s ancient tradition that remains only in Suzu. 

There are lots of saltpans around the Otani district in Suzu. The artist felt a profound connection between her surname (formed from the Chinese characters for “salt” and “field”) and the place, and chose as the venue for her work a former nursery on the hill overlooking the sea. She created a work, inspired by an anecdote of one Kikutaro Kakuhana; he had received orders from his superior to protect salt production in his hometown during the WWII instead of being sent to the battlefield, hence passing down the precious method of salt making. By stretching through a space countless red threads from a salt-collecting boat that had been once in actual use, she spun the memory and history of those engaged with the agehama-style salt production, Japan’s ancient tradition that remains only in Suzu. 

There are lots of saltpans around the Otani district in Suzu. The artist felt a profound connection between her surname (formed from the Chinese characters for “salt” and “field”) and the place, and chose as the venue for her work a former nursery on the hill overlooking the sea. She created a work, inspired by an anecdote of one Kikutaro Kakuhana; he had received orders from his superior to protect salt production in his hometown during the WWII instead of being sent to the battlefield, hence passing down the precious method of salt making. By stretching through a space countless red threads from a salt-collecting boat that had been once in actual use, she spun the memory and history of those engaged with the agehama-style salt production, Japan’s ancient tradition that remains only in Suzu.