Chiharu Shiota (b. 1972 in Osaka, Japan) studied painting in Japan and Australia. In the early 1990s she turned away from painting and started focusing on performance and installations in which the body still plays a central role: the act of creating the often monumental constructions consisting of woven thread is very physical. The human body is also often present in the installations in the form of items that are close to the body, like dresses or shoes.

In recent years, Shiota started working with two dimensional media again by creating woven structures on canvas.

“When I began creating canvases again, I was not sure where to start. The two-dimensionality used to restrict me, but with the thread, I am drawing on the canvas again. The single line of thread is like a line in a painting.

Part of my technique is to begin in one spot and then expand the thread outwards, that is why I sometimes add one or two more canvases. I am trying to find an end, but the line just continues, it is endless like my emotions. Much of my work grows from a personal emotion or experience and then expands into something more universal”.

ISTANBUL ART TRIP