21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa

Just as how trees sway, mountains and rivers continue to move ever so slightly, and over a long period of time the Earth changes and takes shape. It is in this context that we humans and all living things go about our lives, repeating the cycle of birth and death. And so mountains, rivers, and life itself are in a state of constant motion. I find myself fascinated by these natural changes and the forces that underlie them, and in order to verify the existence of those forces themselves, I have been creating works that resemble devices, which arrive at a state of completion thanks to my own physical movements. Through my practice, I seek to come into contact with the unknown forms and presences of our world and to contemplate what it means to be alive. In my ongoing work, I have recently turned my focus to water in particular, which serves to connect different environments, living organisms, and materials. When conceptualizing the works for this exhibition, I turned my attention to the rivers of Kanazawa. During my research, I decided to create a work based on the motions involved in panning for gold — that is, the very act of extracting gold from which this city is said to have derived its name. As is well known, gold panning involves scooping up river sand with a pan or dish-like tool, shaking it from side to side to create a kind of flow or current, and washing away the excess sand. Due to gravity, this process causes only the heavier gold to remain in the pan. I found it fascinating how this act of searching for gold as well as the mechanism behind it seemed to make the river and the human one and the same. At the same time, it seemed to me that this act also revealed the helplessness of humans, myself included, who almost became a part of the river while absorbed in this task. Alternatively, driven by greed and curiosity, we venture not only into the river, but even into the earth itself. I decided to create something resembling a vast river by gathering numerous sculptural representations of the very gestures and motions involved in the act of gold panning that have been repeated continuously along the rivers of Kanazawa, in an exploration of the themes of glittering gold, beautiful rivers, mud, sand, and humanity.
(NOMURA Yuka)

NOMURA Yuka

Born in Gifu, Japan in 1994. Nomura obtained a BFA in sculpture from Kanazawa College of Art in 2017 and an MFA in sculpture from Kyoto City University of Arts in 2019. She is interested in the action of fundamental forces that pervade everyday life, society, and nature, and expresses with sculptures and installations the unique time that flows through it.
Her major exhibitions include “AGM Artist in Residence Program 2025 New Places: Changing Focus in Hiroshima” (ART GALLERY miyauchi, Hiroshima, 2025), “TOKAS-Emerging 2025 Yuka Nomura: Glowing Mountain” (Tokyo Arts and Space Hongo, Tokyo, 2025), “Rokko Meets Art 2024 beyond” (Rokko Alpine Botanical Garden, Kobe, 2024), “GO FOR KOGEI
2023” (Rakusuitei Museum of Art, Toyama, 2023), and “KCUA transmit program 2022” (gallery@KCUA, Kyoto, 2022).