I feel that excellent artworks are characterised
by a spirit of criticism as regards history and environment. Tea
Mäkipää's World of Plenty is a brilliant and beautiful
work that lives up to this requirement and reflects the artist's
profound knowledge of Japanese culture.
Thirty metres long and three metres high,
comprised of three panels, World of Plenty was adapted from the
byobu, a Japanese folding screen. It was designed in such a way
that viewers saw completely different worlds in the work depending
on whether they approached it from the left or the right. Created
as a photocollage using the latest computer graphics technology,
World of Plenty depicts an ideal world where humans co-exist peacefully
and lovingly with nature. The question Tea Mäkiää
asks in her work is, “How much benefit do humans really bring
to the world?”
Tsutomu Okada is the chief curator at the Spiral/Wacoal
Art Center in Tokyo.
Atlantis
