This installment of Essence introduces a notable young artist from among the winners of the Taro Okamoto Award for Contemporary Art, Kurumi Wakaki. In addition to her creative activities centering on prints, Ms. Wakaki is a runner who has completed a number of marathons. We received many comments from this unique and athletic artist about what changed after winning the award.

The piece that won the award, “Men” (Mask), is one that was born out of the support I received from many different people. When a judge said to me at the award ceremony “If you don’t continue to work as an artist from now we judges will not be able to stand it” It did not sound like a joke, and so I responded by anxiously repeating, “Thanks to everyone’s support, thanks to everyone’s support.” All the while I was fervently hoping that people wouldn’t place high expectations on me.

After the exhibition of the winning piece at the Taro Okamoto Museum of Art in Kawasaki was over, I was so relieved from the anxiety that I slept for days. I felt a little depressed after that and so I casually typed that I wanted to die into a web search engine and got a lot of hits. As an experiment I tried a “test to determine how much you want to die” and realized that I didn’t want to die. After that I cheered up.

I only really came to know Taro Okamoto’s work after I won the award. I experienced the power of his art when I did my performance piece surrounded by his work at the Taro Okamoto Memorial Museum. I think that those who feel that Taro’s work is hard to approach should spend as long a time as possible near it.

My greatest goal right now is to complete a 250 km marathon next year. Since I have made it this far hiding my weak mind with physical force, I have the hunch that if I run a 250km marathon I will be able to feel the sense of being able to say that I am an “artist.”

Kurumi Wakaki, “Motor-sama”
The photos below are from the Ms. Wakaki’s solo exhibition, which closed on 6 June 2010.

Born in 1985 in Hokkaido. Graduated from Kyoto City University of Arts in 2008. Won the 12th Taro Okamoto Award for Contemporary Art the same year. In the resulting exhibition, she exhibited prints and did a live performance. Currently resides in Kyoto.