Mai Sakaguchi
Chatswood High School
HAHA NO KYUJO (MOTHER’S PLIGHT)
Printmaking
Soft ground etching on paper
My body of work pays homage to the pain of migration: a deeply personal experience shared by my mother. Moving from Japan to Australia, she was constantly met with cultural and linguistic barriers and a relentless sense of displacement. My work uses plate prints, relief rolls and monoprint processes, layers of colours and images expressing incongruity, intended as an erratic oscillation between emotions of fear, acceptance, despair and grief. Layers of Japanese traditional Noh theatre transcripts represent the nexus between my mother's homeland and the performativity of the diasporic experience; acculturation can be likened to the 'performance' of Western traditions.
My artmaking practice has been influenced by the study and interpretation of the following artists: William Kentridge, David Noonan, David Samuel Stern, Francis Bacon, Rembrandt van Rijn.
Marker's Commentary
Haha no kyujo (mother's plight) presents a series of portrait images that captures the essence of the sitter, revealing her psychological state through depicting a range of dynamic gestures, from impassioned shouts to passive contemplation with a gestural hand on the face. The repetition of these portraits creates a suspended tension, oscillating between the realms of anguish and catharsis. The deliberate line treatment and varying colours employed in this print emphasise the technical prowess and the power of multiple production to enhance viewpoints and pictorial representation. Through these multiple mediated portraits, the artworks evoke connotations of identity and the intricate web of emotions. Raw linework and brash colouring are skilfully utilised to unveil the psychological dissonance inherent in the character depicted. Conceptually these portraits seek to expose the existential concerns of the sitter, embody the vulnerability and anger that define the human condition.
The gestural marks in the etchings clearly exhibit an instinctual character, one that is not passive but rather compelled into action by anger and exhaustion. By focusing on a single subject, the actions convey an enigmatic quality of 'otherness', consolidating a nuanced identity through the accumulation of multiple images, use of Japanese text in the print and the title of the artwork, Haha no kyujo. The angle and treatment employed present resemblance to Lucian Freud's portrait etchings, effectively highlighting the expressive potential of this medium in unveiling a deeper truth about the character.
The evident adeptness in the realm of printmaking and the revision of the stylistic vernacular of etching is seamlessly integrated with an innovative approach to the genre of portraiture.