JN_VK-001

In 2023, during their residency at VILLA KUJOYAMA, Karine Arabian and Franck Blais (JN.Mellor Club) immersed themselves in a Japan steeped in ceremonies and rituals, where beliefs, Shintoism, and ancestral traditions remain deeply present.
Fascinated by the instruments and tools dedicated to these rites, they created a series of objects/sculptures, each piece seemingly originating from an ancient and obscure ritual.
They gathered abandoned objects and fragments from various places in Kyoto, which they assembled and wrapped in Japanese leather, crafted using millennia-old tanning techniques: a white leather, “shironameshi,” tanned with water from the Himeji River, salt, and rapeseed oil; and a black leather, “kurozan,” lacquered with urushi, the traditional Japanese lacquer.
Each intervention reflects a meticulous approach, as if the process were about repairing, caring for, and enveloping—giving birth to new objects with forms that are both mysterious and familiar.

Series of 29 fictional objects/tools made of shironameshi and kurozan leather, thread, wood, and mixed materials.

Series of 9 totemic objects, archaic yet poetic artifacts, made of shironameshi, kurozan, and plunged lamb leather, bamboo, stone, and mixed materials.