Fumio Ren Adachi

My main priority as an artist is to achieve a balance between the artist and the work itself. By this I mean that the artist has a limited role in realizing his creation; he strives to give shape to the raw materials only up to a certain point. After that, the materials respond on their own, guiding the artist’s vision. In this way, man and nature coexist in the resulting creation.

Another equally important goal is to challenge and subvert established aesthetic standards and values. Examples of such standards are good or bad, beautiful or ugly, comfortable or uncomfortable, Western or Eastern, etc. Transcending these categories gives the work of art a youthful, childlike freshness and originality not bound by convention. I ask the viewer to view the work with the pure gaze of a child, in order to see it more truthfully.

I usually try to attain this childlike perspective at the very beginning of the creative process. This allows me to free the work from its conceptual boundaries, rendering it more universal. Such universality is now more important than ever; technology has broken down physical and cultural barriers. I would like my art to reflect this globalization, and persuade people to find unity in diversity, the simple in the complex.

I now use molten glass, gold and platinum foils in my art, beginning with a certain conception, and then allowing the materials to mold the art into the finished product. I also strive for universal shapes and forms. During the creation of a piece, I imagine myself on the plane of the materials, as an equal to them. I admit and accept the nature of the materials, which result in spontaneously changing patterns of melted gold or platinum foils on highly heated molten glass.