Trace of Combustion II — Body is the second work in a five-part sequence that follows the transformation of fireworks from combustion to afterimage.
In this work, the body becomes part of the photographic process. The camera is not held as a neutral recording device, but moved during exposure in response to the brief and unstable appearance of light. The image is created through the tension between control and unpredictability: the artist’s movement, the timing of the explosion, and the behavior of light all enter the same exposure.
The sweeping lines do not describe the firework as an object. Instead, they reveal the movement of a body attempting to remain with a phenomenon that is already disappearing. What appears in the image is not only light, but the trace of a physical encounter between the photographer and an event that cannot be repeated.
Following the first work, Combustion, this image shifts the focus from the release of energy to the body’s response to it. The firework becomes less a spectacle in the sky than a material force that passes through the camera, the hand, and the duration of exposure.
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.”
