{ "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@id": "https://aaploit.com/en/artists/kumagai-ayano/", "@type": "Person", "name": "KUMAGAI Ayano", "alternateName": "くまがいあやの", "url": "https://aaploit.com/en/artists/kumagai-ayano/", "sameAs": "https://aaploit.com/ja/artists/kumagai-ayano/", "affiliation": { "@id": "https://aaploit.com/#organization" }, "birthDate": "1990", "description": "Without erasing the brand logos on secondhand garments, I layer fictional plant motifs over them—forms that fulfill every condition of plant-life while remaining unidentifiable as any existing specie…", "disambiguatingDescription": "An industrial embroidery machine advances at an industrial pace. Which plant motif to summon, where on the garment to place it, at what scale, in which colors of thread—compositional decisions accumulate, one garment at a time.\n\nThe material I choose is secondhand clothing—garments that have already passed through another context, through someone's body, accumulating marks on their surface. Rather than erasing what is already there, I layer over it. What I summon is a fictional plant motif: bearing stems, petals, a tendency to cluster—fulfilling every condition of plant-life while remaining unidentifiable as any existing species. To depict a known species would be to let that plant's cultural memory enter the work. What I need is only the temporal texture of plant-ness, stripped of meaning—the rhythm of growth, circulation, and slow overwriting.\n\nThe pace of the machine and the time of plants move in opposite directions. That contradiction remains unresolved, fixed onto a single garment. On this garment, at least three tenses exist simultaneously: the past accumulated in the secondhand clothing, the present of the marks already there, and a time not yet arrived, indicated by plant motifs that have no name. They carry no resolution—remaining unsolved, continuing to overlap.", "cv": [ { "section": "EDUCATION" }, { "year": "2014", "entries": [ "BA in Textile Design, Tokyo Zokei University, Tokyo" ] }, { "year": "2016", "entries": [ "MA in Design, Tokyo Zokei University, Tokyo" ] }, { "section": "SOLO EXHIBITIONS" }, { "year": "2025", "entries": [ "Imprint – Texture of Logos, aaploit, Tokyo 2022 altitude, aaploit, Tokyo" ] }, { "section": "GROUP EXHIBITIONS (SELECTED)" }, { "year": "2023", "entries": [ "The Figure 8 Dance, Koganecho Artist-in-Residence, Kanagawa", "Tokyo Zokei University 9th Teaching Assistant Exhibition, Tokyo" ] }, { "year": "2022", "entries": [ "Tokyo Zokei University 8th Teaching Assistant Exhibition, Tokyo", "SICF23, Spiral, Tokyo", "Hand-held Art Charity / Eco Bag Art Exhibition, Okayama" ] }, { "year": "2017", "entries": [ "Cheongju International Craft Biennale, Cheongju, South Korea" ] }, { "year": "2016", "entries": [ "The Dorothy Waxman Textile Design Prize, New York, USA", "The 2nd Young Textile Art Triennial - YTAT 2016, Poland" ] }, { "year": "2015", "entries": [ "Japan Craft in IWATA, Public Glassmaking and Metalworking Facility, Iwata", "bi chu watabokkee - From Wood to Yarn, Okayama" ] }, { "section": "RESIDENCIES & FELLOWSHIPS" }, { "year": "2015", "entries": [ "Bitchu Art Bridge (Okayama Prefecture), Okayama" ] }, { "section": "WORKSHOPS" }, { "year": "2022", "entries": [ "Sakiami Workshop, aaploit, Tokyo" ] }, { "year": "2017", "entries": [ "Sakiami Workshop, mee mee center sumeba, Shimosuwa" ] }, { "section": "AWARDS & GRANTS" }, { "year": "2018", "entries": [ "57th Japan Craft Exhibition, Reiko Sudo Prize" ] }, { "year": "2016", "entries": [ "Tokyo Zokei University, ZOKEI Award" ] }, { "year": "2015", "entries": [ "54th Japan Craft Exhibition, The Yomiuri Shimbun Prize" ] } ], "biography": [ { "year": "", "entries": [ "Can unnamed life take root on the surface of desire's signs? Kumagai Ayano pursues this question through cloth. She selects secondhand garments bearing brand logos and layers fictional plants over them by industrial embroidery machine—forms that fulfill every structural condition of plant-life while remaining unidentifiable as any existing species. The logos are not erased; they remain beneath the petals, as if still breathing. Having worked within apparel production and distribution, Kumagai chose the industrial machine—a tool that advances at industrial pace—as the very means by which to introduce the time of plants. She holds a BFA in Textile Design and an MFA from Tokyo Zokei University (2016)." ] } ], "relatedLink": "https://aaploit.com/en/artists/kumagai-ayano/works/" }, { "@id": "https://aaploit.com/en/exhibitions/kumagai-ayano-tidal-logos-on-the-flat/", "@type": "ExhibitionEvent", "name": "Tidal - Logos on the Flat", "url": "https://aaploit.com/en/exhibitions/kumagai-ayano-tidal-logos-on-the-flat/", "sameAs": "https://aaploit.com/ja/exhibitions/kumagai-ayano-tidal-logos-on-the-flat/", "startDate": "2026-04-10", "endDate": "2026-04-26", "location": "aaploit, Tokyo", "artists": [ { "@id": "https://aaploit.com/en/artists/kumagai-ayano/" } ] }, { "@id": "https://aaploit.com/en/exhibitions/kumagai-ayano-imprint-texture-of-logos/", "@type": "ExhibitionEvent", "name": "Imprint – Texture of Logos", "url": "https://aaploit.com/en/exhibitions/kumagai-ayano-imprint-texture-of-logos/", "sameAs": "https://aaploit.com/ja/exhibitions/kumagai-ayano-imprint-texture-of-logos/", "startDate": "2025-01-17", "endDate": "2025-02-02", "location": "aaploit, Tokyo", "artists": [ { "@id": "https://aaploit.com/en/artists/kumagai-ayano/" } ] }, { "@id": "https://aaploit.com/en/exhibitions/kumagai-ayano-altitude/", "@type": "ExhibitionEvent", "name": "altitude", "url": "https://aaploit.com/en/exhibitions/kumagai-ayano-altitude/", "sameAs": "https://aaploit.com/ja/exhibitions/kumagai-ayano-altitude/", "startDate": "2022-11-03", "endDate": "2022-11-27", "location": "aaploit, Tokyo", "artists": [ { "@id": "https://aaploit.com/en/artists/kumagai-ayano/" } ] }, { "@id": "https://aaploit.com/en/journal/kumagai-ayano-review-01/", "@type": "Article", "headline": "Fictive Botany: Kumagai Ayano's Practices", "url": "https://aaploit.com/en/journal/kumagai-ayano-review-01/", "description": "The plants Kumagai Ayano depicts do not exist. What spreads across signs that have lost their readers is a vegetation that does not yet have a name.", "about": [ { "@id": "https://aaploit.com/en/artists/kumagai-ayano/" } ] } ] }