Strip District Gallery Society for Contemporary Craft 2100 Smallman Street Pittsburgh, PA 15222 www.contemporarycraft.org

About this show
by Keiko Myamori

Three years ago, January 2000, I visited a forest in Ryugasaqki-city in Japan.

The area had just been decided to be developed as a city park project. Many of the trees were marked wityh tape, which meant those trees would be cut off for the project.

I made an art installation in the forest using tree rubbings on Washi paper, which were hung in the forest over a lenght of 57 meters. (Click here to see this installation)

In February, 2003, I visited the same area in Japan. It is still under construction, and the forest seemed dry.

However, some of the trees had survived. I covered those trees with Washi paper and rubbed the surface with charcoal.

These transformed Washi papers were brought to the United States and were pasted onto the piano, which is seen in this show, "Melody".

My hope is to encourage the survival of those trees by having people think about them and play music to celebrate our existence on the earth.