Mio Shirai interviewed for Leaving Language.
Mio Shirai's telegenic tonalities mix fabricated landscape in narratives that make life's inevitable dramas seem a little easier ... if only just a teeny. With an eloquence across a variety of mediums, including sculpture, film and textiles the artist is an experienced narrator of ideas, giving a gentle nudge to those fables that help us along in the awkward steps of an adult world. With works that allow a space for the objectivity of play and remind us that every nation began as a series of stories and legends.
"Across The River the large tapestry by Mio Shirai which retells a perennial tale of crossings., symbolic or actual, on arrival in the gallery it was unfolded and tied with black ribbon then suspended from the ceiling. The curator and the Artist discussed how it functioned in dialogue with the Artworks around it. The richness of the image was to be a scenic device that pulled everything together in its multiple threads of embroidery.
Across The River gently guided visitors with it's magical waters flowing between a mountainous landscape, in Japan legendary spirits can gather on the banks of rivers and play havoc with humans. The day of the opening there was a distant and savage laughter cracking into thunderous sky, turning pavements into temporary streams and gullies. Who was now travelling across these waters, maybe an invisible boatman had come to transport the spirits of the sea and introduce them to a language of another place?" - Leaving Language The Catalogue