Exhibition
Setagaya Museum
World expositions & Exhibitions
GK has created displays for world expositions, trade shows and various exhibitions; The Setagaya Museum exhibit is a retrospective on the philosophy and creations of GK Design.
The theme of “In pursuit of a harmonious coexistence of humans, nature and Dougu” is brought to life with a utopian garden display of a man made heaven.
Exhibition
GK Group Exhibition “Setagaya Exhibition”. To celebrate the 60th anniversary, the GK Group exhibited a commentary on the balance between life and humans, nature and animals.
Setagaya Exhibition
Prospectus
Exploring the Future of Design with Organizational Creative Competence
The GK Group will mark the 60th anniversary of its foundation in 2012. Since the beginning, we have caught the trends of times and offered our design works and messages to society reflecting the trends. In particular, in the “Dougu Mandala Exhibition” in 1985, and the “The Origin of the Establishment of a Dougu Temple and a Dougu Village Exhibition” and others, we presented our attempts in the “figuration of things” and “relations with humans” in our search for the ideal relationship between humans and Dougu. For this exhibition, we expressed, from a broader perspective, the ideal mindset of humans to harmonize “nature, humans and Dougu” using the “Lotus Flowers in a Pond” 1) as a metaphor. It was an attempt to search for a “utopia of design” through producing things, and to show the future direction of all living on the earth.
(Dougu means tools, instruments, devices, equipment and so on)
Today, the GK Group with GK Design as its head office embraces various design firms which are engaged independently in designs in their respective special fields. In the background is the “organizational creative competence.” For this exhibition, all the firms have come together to present the results of mutual cooperation
Toward the Future
Building the “Future of Humans and Dougu” with the prayer for the repose of the souls of victims.
While we were preparing for this exhibition, the Great East Japan Earthquake occurred on March 11, 2011. Many lost their lives or were seriously affected, and the nation was deeply hurt mentally. We realized the great power of nature and learned the difficulty, pleasure and importance for nature, humans and Dougu to live together. It is our heartfelt wish that the Japanese people would unite to respect nature, humans and Dougu, and convey the feeling to the world. We will make every effort in designing and producing things with requiescat for post-earthquake rehabilitation and revitalization.
The image of utopia symbolized by “Lotus flowers in a pond.” It implies that human desire can be infinitely expanded by the wisdom of the creation of nature and by being enveloped by the universe. We attempted to express this view of the world to be the closest possible to a natural landscape using a man-made universe in this exhibition space design.
With the picture of the Dougu Temple Dougu Village and the projected image of the moon in the background, the pond of lotuses extends all over the floor. The 250 square meters wide hall was filled with 1000 lotus flowers made of resin and paper. As they are reflected on the mirror walls on the three sides, the lotus flowers appear to continue endlessly.
Considering the movement from moonrise to moonset as a cycle, the lighting of the lotus pond, the sound of the wind bell, the singing of birds, and the movement of Kalavinka, an imaginary human-headed bird in Buddhist paradise are programmed and present the flow of time.
The Kalavinka nestled in the serene lotus pond embodies the strength and tenderness of things living in harmony with nature. The figure of a bird that flexibly moves to the breeze sweeping across the pond is intentionally made of contrasting metallic materials. It is presented taking advantage of diverse and skillful surface finishes.
Precision bearings are built in a balancing structure. With the power of a soft wind , the neck, head, wings and the body of the bird move softly in coordination. By allowing all the parts to move randomly, the natural movement of a bird is reproduced which cannot be produced by an artificial control system. The motor is installed only on the foot part. By giving contrast to the movement of other parts, the beauty of life is expressed as a whole.
The lightly structured frame and large but fine wheel of the vehicle contains a message to “Large and heavy vehicles”. With the look of a profound thinker, the celestial nymph coolly looks at the present society. Its figure appears to be floating in the air responding to the movement of the vehicle. Under the garment, the body is made of a truss structure and the head of a single pipe to emphasize its Noh mask-like face. By grasping the body symbolically, the physical presence of the body is weakened. Thus, a spiritual world beyond figurative representations is expressed. A new view of the world is created in which real images and virtual images are woven together.
