Moemi Takano

I have been seeking a visual language that makes sense of our everyday experiences in the face of the current social-ecological disequilibrium. In pursuit of a new mode of planetary being, I see my artistic practice as a challenge to our attitude towards materials in a broader sense.

Over the recent years, I have been trying to broaden my lexical horizons, mainly through travelling around the world and learning indigenous techniques as they relate to textile production. While the acts of spinning, dyeing, weaving, sewing, and embroidering are intrinsically linked to human hands, the end product has, since ancient times, represented something intangible, such as authority or awe, or conveyed religious ideas in the shape of clothing or ritual objects. Although the information delivered by the grids of warp and weft has been replaced by pixels on digital devices, our lives are still inseparable from textiles. Can time-consuming handicrafts of fibres still have a voice in the contemporary world of acceleration, intolerance, and ideologies without a body? Can they serve as a catalyst for redefining our consciousness around abstract concepts that encompass/transcend individual existence in this time of the pandemic, conflicts and climate change? I examine those questions at the intersections between the mundane and the sublime, human and non-human, as well as textile and art history.

A Pinch-of-Salt Island

Embroidered fabric, hand-woven

jute and cotton, acrylic, spray paint

and wall material on panel

35cm x 33cm x 5.8cm

2022

By anchoring tactile threads to a heterogeneous assemblage of solid materials, the work seeks to express the inseparability of symbolic surface and physical space, as well as political territory and local experience.

Pilgrim, This Road This Morning

Dyed cotton and jute, plaster,

acrylic paint, spray paint and ABS pipe

59cm x 46cm

2023

The work attempts to incorporate spontaneity and improvisation into the highly structured weaving techniques used in tapestry making. The textile can then be compared to the act of walking, which has a certain structure but welcomes detours, diversions and wanderings.