INFO
| Name | Yukari 海堀 Kaihori (she/her) |
| Country of Birth | Japan |
| Place of Residence | Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland |
| Ethnicities | Japanese |
| Artform | Visual arts |
| Decades Active | 2000s, 2010s, 2020s |
ABOUT
Yukari 海堀 Kaihori is a visual artist based in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland. Her practice explores a more-than-human world, drawing on Japanese folk animism and considering the life force in materials through respect and awareness of one’s immediate environment. Born in Kyoto, Kaihori moved with her family to São Paulo as a child and has lived in Japan, Brazil, USA and Aotearoa since 2011.
Kaihori’s recent works have responded to the exhibiting location, both within and outside of the gallery. Her palette of objects and processes often includes stones, seeds, washi paper and casting. Incorporating materials found and relating to place, Kaihori carefully investigates the details of a particular site to consider where the essence of materiality begins and ends.
Kaihori’s solo exhibition two sides of the moon (2023) at Te Tuhi was a materially-led inquiry around the intersection between the natural and human-made. This came about through the discovery of a connection between Japan and Aotearoa through iron sand extraction and heavy industry.
Touching Time (2022), a solo exhibition at Audio Foundation, was ‘an invitation to become more aware, to tune in to and feel the exquisite qualities of the immediate ecology and environment around us.’ For the exhibition, Kaihori made contact with the City Rail Link construction site across the road from the gallery on Beresford Square. Work being carried out 22m underground became the source of sandstone that Kaihori installed in the exhibition space. Although the stone began forming 17-21 million years ago, it crumbles and dissolves in a matter of seconds between the artist’s fingers. The exhibition grasps at such contrast between human time scales and that of the environment we inhabit.
Kaihori was a recipient of the Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant in 2015, and has been awarded numerous residencies including the MA Umi artist residency, Japan (2023), the Vermont Studio Art Artist Residency, USA (2015), and the Oberpfälzer Künstlerhaus artist residency, Germany (2017). She graduated with a BA in Studio Art from Lewis & Clark College, Portland, Oregon in 2004. In 2021, Kaihori graduated with an MFA from Elam School of Fine Arts, where she is currently a doctoral candidate.
LINKS
Key works / presentations
2024 — Two Inches off the Ground, Grace, Tāmaki Makaurau
2023 — two sides of the Moon, Te Tuhi, Tāmaki Makaurau
2022 — Touching Time, Audio Foundation, Tāmaki Makaurau
2022 — The Quiet Place I Search for: In situ (ɪn ˈsɪtju /室/ Shitsu しつ), Meanwhile, Pōneke
2022 — Wiggling together, Falling apart, Michael Lett gallery, Tāmaki Makaurau, group exhibition organised by Lucy Meyle & Victoria Wynne-Jones
2022 — The Moon and the Pavement, The Physics Room in partnership with Ashburton Art Gallery, Ōtautahi, group exhibition curated by Abby Cunnane
2021 — In Searching of Deities, RM Gallery, Tāmaki Makaurau
2020 — Iteration 9, Stella Brennan and Yukari Kaihori, Mothermother, Tāmaki Makaurau
2020 — Places, 'in-between', Public Record, Tāmaki Makaurau
2020 — We Painted the Wall with Cracks, play_station, Pōneke, group exhibition
Key awards
2023 — MA Umi artist residency, Japan
2023 — Driving Creek, Coromandel, New Zealand
2018 — Willapa Bay Artist Residency, USA (Full Fellowship)
2017 — Oberpfälzer Künstlerhaus, Schwandof (residency), Germany
2017 — Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts (Full Fellowship) USA
2016, 2017 — Virginia Creative Center for the Arts, Artist Residency Fellow USA
2016 — EAT Grant (Emergent Artist Trust) Grant, Pōneke
2015 — 30 Upstairs Art Space and Gallery, 3 months Artist in Residency, Pōneke
2015 – Vermont Studio Art Artist Residency (Full Fellowship), USA
2015 – Pollock Krasner Foundation Grant
