{"id":610078,"date":"2026-07-29T14:08:39","date_gmt":"2026-07-29T14:08:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/610078\/"},"modified":"2026-07-29T14:08:39","modified_gmt":"2026-07-29T14:08:39","slug":"ayumi-tsuchiya-on-her-interactive-sculptures-and-making-by-hand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/610078\/","title":{"rendered":"ayumi tsuchiya on her interactive sculptures and making by hand"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ayumi Tsuchiya\u2019s wooden sculptures encourage curiosity<\/p>\n

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Children rarely stop to ask how Ayumi Tsuchiya\u2019s sculptures<\/strong><\/a> work but intuitively climb inside them, rock back and forth, push, pull, and listen. Adults, on the other hand, look for instructions first. That difference has become one of the defining observations behind the Japanese artist\u2019s practice. Across hand-built wooden<\/strong><\/a> chairs<\/strong><\/a>, musical seesaws, oversized carved bowls, and flower-like seats, Tsuchiya\u2019s practice revolves around objects that ask for the body as much as the eye. Her works occupy a space between sculpture, furniture, instrument<\/strong><\/a>, and playground<\/strong><\/a>, asking to be used before they are understood. \u2018Children begin to play instinctively,\u2019 she tells<\/a> designboom.<\/strong> \u2018When adults see my work, they initially try to ask how to use it, but children first touch it and understand how to interact with it and how it works through experience.\u2019<\/p>\n

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A rocking chair becomes a bench when turned upside down. A flower-shaped chair gently folds around the person sitting inside it. A seesaw becomes a xylophone as riders move together, while a monumental wooden bowl, hollowed out by hand, invites visitors to climb in and sway as if they had suddenly shrunk into the world of Japanese folklore. \u2018Children are geniuses. That\u2019s not to say adults aren\u2019t\u2014it\u2019s just that because they understand the rules of society and try to live by common sense, they seek an explanation first. Through my work, I hope that adults, in particular, will reconnect with the sensibility that lies dormant within them,\u2019 the artist shares.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"ayumi
Thumbelina\u2019s Chair | all images courtesy of Ayumi Tsuchiya<\/p>\n

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Creating spaces for people to connect<\/p>\n

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Ayumi Tsuchiya didn\u2019t arrive at this way of working through a fascination with contemporary art. Quite the opposite. \u2018I love creating things,\u2019 she tells us.<\/strong> \u2018But to be honest, I wasn\u2019t really interested in art to begin with. I didn\u2019t find much enjoyment in simply going to an art museum and just looking at the works.\u2019 She became more and more interested in what could happen around an artwork and not so much in front of it.\u2018That\u2019s why I wanted to create interactive artworks, and more than that, I wanted to create the space itself where people can communicate through these works,\u2019 the artist<\/a> adds.<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Music runs through many of Ayumi Tsuchiya\u2019s projects, though not for the reason one might expect. \u2018The reason I incorporate music is that I can\u2019t play any instruments,\u2019 she admits.<\/strong> \u2018I love to sing, but I was terrible at it. That\u2019s why I have such a strong longing for music.\u2019 The artist began building instruments that almost anyone could play. In works like Do-Re-Mi-Fa-Si-So, melodies emerge through movement, while Doremi-fa Sofa turns shifting body weight into a simple musical composition as wooden balls travel across a xylophone.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"ayumi
Circle Song<\/p>\n

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Handcrafted woodworking and kinetic design<\/p>\n

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Every piece starts as a sketch before moving through technical drawings, timber selection, joinery, and fabrication, all carried out by the artist herself. \u2018I have things I want to create,\u2019 Ayumi Tsuchiya shares with designboom.<\/strong> \u2018But more than that, I have a deep desire to keep using my hands to make things.\u2019<\/p>\n

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\u2018I sketch, draw blueprints, select the wood, and do all the processing myself. I love visualizing the piece, choosing the wood, figuring out how to build it, and actually making it with my own hands,\u2019 the artist adds.<\/strong><\/p>\n

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In an age where interactive art is increasingly driven by screens, sensors, and software, Tsuchiya continues to build experiences through gravity, balance, gears, timber, and touch. The mechanics remain visible, and so does the hand of the maker. \u2018I think digitization is wonderful. I also like digital art,\u2019 she says.<\/strong> \u2018But aside from that, I\u2019m an analog person at heart.\u2019 <\/p>\n

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These carefully crafted objects, chairs, bowls, and instruments are really invitations to move, to listen, to laugh, and perhaps to remember, if only for a moment, what it feels like to approach the world with the curiosity of a child.<\/p>\n

\"ayumi
Singing circle<\/p>\n

\"ayumi
Singing circle<\/p>\n

\"ayumi
Gear Wonderland No.12<\/p>\n

\"ayumi
Gear Wonderland No.10<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ayumi Tsuchiya\u2019s wooden sculptures encourage curiosity \u00a0 Children rarely stop to ask how Ayumi Tsuchiya\u2019s sculptures work but…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":610079,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[267],"tags":[49171,365,362,363,364,366,18,117,19,9914,17,9351,7601,3489],"class_list":["post-610078","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-art-interviews","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-artsdesign","tag-design","tag-eire","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-interactive-installation","tag-ireland","tag-play","tag-sculpture","tag-wood-and-timber-architecture-and-design"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/117003663312309637","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/610078","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=610078"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/610078\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/610079"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=610078"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=610078"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=610078"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}