The work of Lisa Keiko Kirton is inspired by the changing and evolving world.  She responds to nature itself, which is constantly changing and yet at the same time the rhythms of the seasons bring harmony. 

The work One Step from the Womb itself has been a cyclical process beginning in 1991 with a canvas being placed on Lisa’s driveway.  Over a period of 3 months photographs were taken recording the changes caused by nature and man. 

These photographs were printed on similar shaped canvasses and exhibited in 1996 together with an interactive exhibition in London, followed by one in Aberdeen. 

In these exhibitions visitors were invited to participate by drawing, writing or leaving marks on canvases laid across the floor.  The contribution of 400 people of 14 nationalities were then cut up and reworked as a collage presented as eight giant slices of bread.   The contributions of visitors to the exhibition represent their own impact on the process of change.  The idea of the individual and individuality is more prominent in the West than in Lisa’s native Japan and she believes that it is attained knowledge, combined with human encounters that develop out inner self.

The idea behind making marks on canvas in this work is symbolic of the way humans also make marks on their own lives and those of others.  The piece represents the development of the inner self through stepping out into the world, and encounters both internal and external-a meeting mixing of experiences.

The idea of the two venues for the exhibition, North and South is also meeting and mixing up.  The resulting piece One Step from the Womb-Bread together, along with all the symbolic associations of bread.

Exhibitions of One Step from the Womb-Bread were held at Diorama in London in 1999 and at Aberdeen Arts Centre in 2000. 

 The ingredients for the loaf included 80kg of flour and 80 kg of salt which made 8 slices and were kneaded in Lisa’s kitchen.  They were then baked in the kiln of the Scottish Sculpture workshop (SSW) because of their size.  The loaf was monumental and had the quality of standing stones.

One Step from the Womb-Field was a culmination of the previous work and unexpectedly became caught up in the changing and shifting forces of nature itself.  One Step from the Womb-Field was to have been an event on take place to the accompaniment of Japanese folk music in Charles Esson’s field near Collieston on September 2nd in association with Japan 2001. 

 However, the event was sadly and suddenly cancelled only three days before the opening because of foot and mouth restrictions in the area.  It took three ore attempt, due to bad weather and transport problems before the eight giant slices of bread could finally be “laid to rest” in the field in December 2001, silently, without music or spectators.

The giant slices left in the field have been further subjected to the changing elements.

Symbolic of nature’s cyclical processes the work has been ‘returned to the earth’ by allowing it to slowly disintegrate into the soil.  What is taken from the earth eventually land to fertilize ideas of collective contributions, conversion and transformation, stressing regenerative qualities of nature, taking fragments and individual actions and making them part of cohesive whole.

Sue Webber
Artist and writer