Alexa Hatanakaside by each 2.0

Alexa Hatanaka’s side by each 2.0 at AXENÉO7 offers an immersive overview of the artist’s ongoing work with traditional forms of print and papermaking, as well as her adaptations of these media into new experimental and sculptural forms. The exhibition showcases her recent explorations of paper clothing, alongside a selection of her earlier woodblock prints and two newly created banners of hand-dyed and stitched paper squares. Through all these works, run Hatanaka’s personal explorations of her Japanese-Canadian heritage and ruminations on the transmission of collective and personal histories through (re)engagements with traditional cultural practices. In the centre of the gallery, nine figures (each represented by a set of paper garments) are arranged in a circle around a cluster of suspended koinobori (carp windsocks). The figures seem to be following one another in a perpetual dance — moving in the typical circular formation of Japanese folk dances, which Hatanaka and her brother learned as children. The figures range in size to suggest diverse ages, bodies, and modes of movement. We might imagine a toddler balancing uneasily on its small feet, two teenagers skipping arm in arm, or an elderly grandparent shuffling slowly along. A sense of dynamic movement pervades this multi-generational gathering, in part thanks to custom-designed wooden armatures, sized to support each body and adorned with carved abstracted hands (a collaboration with artist and woodworker Yorgo Liapis). The sense of liveliness is further accentuated by the paper tabi (socks) sitting below each character. Comfortable gaps between each of the figures allow visitors to gently place themselves within the procession and observe up close the rich details of printed textures, images, and patterns that make up each patchwork garment. Alexa Hatanakaside by each 2.0, exhibition view, 2022.Photo: John Healey, courtesy of AXENÉO7, Gatineau While the procession of paper figures could have held the large space on its own, Hatanaka’s inclusion of additional 2D works adds important depth and context. Selected woodblock prints are presented on the north and south walls, revealing the source of the imagery used in some of the clothing, while two horizontal banners on the east and west walls spell out shoganai (it can’t be helped) in Roman and Hiragana characters. Repeating the motif of the fish, a final patchwork noren (banner) at the threshold combines dozens of small scraps of paper to catch the light streaming in from the next room. Hatanaka also created a custom playlist, a mix of traditional Japanese folk dance songs and the dancehall and Afrobeat she listened to while creating the work. The music was available to stream while walking through the exhibition, bringing an additional sonic element to the experience. Since 2019, Hatanaka has been creating garments inspired by kamiko, a form of traditional Japanese paper clothing. By adapting this traditional technique to create contemporary garments, Hatanaka gives form to personal and communal stories of grief, tragedy, family history, and resilience. Kamiko is an ancient practice dating back to 910 CE when Buddhist monks used paper clothing as part of certain ceremonies. The practice gained widespread use during the Edo Period (1603 −1868), and has in recent years experienced something of a revival, as a younger generation of makers has aimed to keep the practice alive and preserve the technical and land-based knowledge required for its production.See Daphne Mohajer va Pesaran, “People and Placelessness: Paper Clothing in Japan,” Fashion Practice 10, no. 2 (2018): 236 −55; and Cameron Allan McKean and Daphne Mohajer va Pesaran, “Kamiko: Growing paper clothes in rural Japan,” The Japan Times (website), 15 July 2017, accessible online. By treating washi (Japanese paper) with starch, kakishibu (persimmon tannin dye), or konnyaku (Devil’s Tongue root paste) Hatanaka transforms this seemingly delicate material into a durable, malleable “cloth” that can be stitched and shaped. Alexa Hatanakaside by each 2.0, exhibition views, 2022.Photos: John Healey, courtesy of AXENÉO7, Gatineau Where historically, kamiko was worn by farmers, firefighters, and even wealthy elites, Hatanaka is now creating garments that speak to contemporary uses, including a set of hazmat suits and accompanying cloth face masks. In side by each 2.0, the suits hang alongside more traditional items of clothing such as happi jackets and shorts. Pieced together from her personal archive of prints, the patchwork technique in all her clothing offers a stunning and intricate combination of embedded stories while also speaking to an effort to (re)use the materials at hand. The meticulously cut and stitched pieces include excerpts from more than a decade’s work: layered snow formations in Kinngait (where Hatanaka has long-standing collaborations through her work with collectives Embassy of Imagination and Kinngarni Katujjiqatigiit) are interspersed with tenderly rendered portraits of her grandmother Mariko. Prints made by laying a sheet of paper onto a fish and gently rubbing (a practice used by fishers to gauge size and health) sit alongside scenes depicting rescue workers in hazmat suits following the 2011 earthquake in Japan. Here, transformative global and personal events are linked across distance and time, and the causes and consequences of large-scale tragedies (both human and environmental) are brought into dialogue with daily lived experiences. Each stitched piece holds the weight of these personal and communal events, joined together here to speak eloquently about the way that memories are held in the body while also being protected, transmitted, and commemorated through cultural practices, like making clothes or dancing. The hazmat suits — complete with hoods, ties at wrists and ankles, and in some cases masks — bring a slightly foreboding air to the otherwise joyful procession. These thin but sturdy suits normally offer protection from hazardous materials or substances, alluding to the ambient threat of disease, airborne toxins, pollution, or other unseen forces that pervade our ecologically degraded and pandemic-inflected lives. Another of Hatanaka’s suits is currently on display across the river at the National Gallery of Canada alongside works by Lorna Simpson, Jutai Toonoo, and William Noah that similarly speak to the complex relationships between humans and the natural world. But as Hatanaka’s banner text at AXENÉO7 intones, there is nevertheless the inevitability of continuing to march, dance, rejoice, and tell stories even as we learn to cope with difficult things. Alexa Hatanaka, Nicole Burisch

Alexa Hatanaka
side by each 2.0

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