Future Memories of the Sea, 2023
Gouache, Watercolor, Papercutting
22″ x 30″
Future Memories of the Sea envisions a possible future where the US and Japanese militaries fail to complete the construction of US Marine Corps Air Station Futenma on Oura Bay in Okinawa, and the sacred reef and endangered dugong persist. In addition to a thriving coral scape and dugong feeding beds, the painting features a bakekujira, or ghostwhale, but envisioned as an Okinawan whale shark, or jinbei. This bake-jinbei is a hopeful symbol of the spiritual and ecological health of the sacred oceans and ecosystems.
This painting is named after and references the work of Japanese visual artist Tomiyama Taeko’s famous painting series, At the bottom of the Pacific, specifically ‘Memories of the Sea.” Tomiyama’s (1923-2021) work addressed the spirit-loss and violence of Japanese identity post-war, and wove together human and spirit worlds.