Hajikaku-chan: TUMIKI

My feelings of admiration, desire and helplessness towards gender, became rooted deeply inside of me and began to have a shape without my knowing. These then manifested as a character – this is Hajikaku-chan. In the unstable understanding and familiarity, that Hajikaku-chan is a complete stranger although somewhat resembling of myself, by confronting it, I give shape to the irrepressible feelings that are inside of me.

I’d had the vague wish to have a conversation with young artists, about the question of what characters are. I myself am an idolater, addressing images of parakeets, ants and grasshoppers as deus ex machina – it was obvious I had sought a companion for this. I then had the opportunity to visit the Tohoku University of Art and Design. I don’t wish to take part in the determinism, to say coincidence is also inevitable, however, I encountered a character-native third year student who tackled the challenges with post-characters all alone. There is something definitively different about us Japanese, from the characters of Paul McCarthy or Mike Kelley… I have a hunch that he may suspend a curious rope bridge, amongst the enormous crevasses that spread here and there.

（Noboru Tsubaki）