About the artwork

White cotton balls of thread are placed on shelves at the entrance to the installation. Picking up one ball of thread and stepping into the interior, a space surrounded by a circular wall, a visitor finds a large thread ball overwhelming the space. As visitors add cotton thread to it, the ball, initially two meters across, gradually grows larger. The interior side of the wall shows women in a forest holding balls of thread. Threads fall like rain from the upper part of the wall. The visitors’ horizontal movements as they add new threads to the ball, intersect the vertical movement of the threads on the wall. To visitors this installation may be a reminder of the mutual connections among human beings, nature and Tokamachi’s textile industry. Like the expanding ball, the history of textiles may continue to develop through people’s spontaneous involvement.(*)