Trace of Combustion I — Combustion is the opening work in a five-part sequence that follows the life of a firework from ignition to afterimage.
Fireworks are usually seen as spectacle, but here the subject is not the event itself. The work focuses on combustion as an irreversible release of energy: gunpowder becomes light, light becomes movement, and movement leaves only a trace.
The image was made through long exposure and bodily camera movement. During the brief interval of explosion, the camera does not simply record the firework; it responds to it. The resulting form is neither a document nor a digital construction, but a physical encounter between fire, time, chance, and the artist’s body.
In this first work, the center appears overloaded with light, as if matter is still being born. Red and gold lines expand outward while the surrounding darkness remains present, suggesting that disappearance is already contained within emergence. The image holds the unstable moment before structure, void, and residue begin to appear.
The final exhibition piece will be produced as a unique work: an A1 pigment print on washi, mounted on a vertical washi support. No other piece will be produced with the same image, size, and presentation format. Depending on the architecture and atmosphere of the exhibition space, it may be presented slightly floating from the wall or suspended from above with thin wires. The installation method will be adjusted to create the strongest relationship between the work, the wall, the surrounding air, and the viewer’s body.
From the series “Trace of Combustion — Fireworks, Body, and the Afterimage of Disappearance.”
