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Frozen Flowers, © Azuma Makoto, © amkk Project, photo: © Shiinoki Shunsuke

EXTREME FLOWER SCULPTURE

Azuma Makoto

Words by Maria Bellotto

I know a bank where the wild thyme blows,
Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows,
Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine,
With sweet musk-roses and with eglantine.

William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night’s Dream

In Japanese culture, Wabi Sabi is a concept that focuses on the acceptance of transience and imperfection, on appreciating the beauty – in nature – that is impermanent and incomplete. In a world that runs faster and always strives for progress, efficiency, and perfection at all costs, however, some artists still aim to find beauty in transience and ephemerality.

Azuma Makoto and his creative studio, AMKK, develop experimental floral and botanical creations, aiming to increase the existential value of flowers by finding out the most mysterious figure only owned by them and plants and converting them to artistic expression.

This search for ephemerality and uniqueness that permeates Makoto’s works began in a completely diverse field than the botanical one; he was, in fact, a musician working part-time in a flower shop when he first discovered the beauty of flowers and realised the common points among music, plants and humans and the unique bond that connects them.

 

Frozen Flowers, © Azuma Makoto, © amkk Project, photo: © Shiinoki Shunsuke

“They are both momentary and unique on their own,” explains Makoto. “Just as there are as many expressions of red roses as they exist, music is also always different depending on the mood and the feelings of the player and the environment in which it was created. Both music and flower art require us to express ourselves, by gathering all those factors. This is one of the greatest reasons why I became indulged in this world.”

But Makoto is not just a flower designer; describing his works is a challenging task since it’s a merge of floral art, sculpture, and, somehow, haute-couture. His majestic pieces take place in the most incredible locations: from snowy lands in Hokkaido, Japan, to the Okinawa sea depths, Makoto and his creative studio design and develop impressive botanical sculpture that features more than one hundred varieties of flowers. And behind such masterpieces, there is a praiseworthy idea of what beauty in nature is for the artist:

“flowers have already completed the evolution of their beauty, their existence in nature so I always keep in mind that my work should not be an imitation of it.”

Indeed, as he explains, Makoto feels the need to create a different expression of beauty, that cannot easily be created physically or mentally. “The lives of flowers and my life are constantly blending in with each other, and that is why I can put my soul into my artwork by uniting myself with flowers under such an extreme state.” The goal? To further explore new aspects of plants and express their beauty by bringing out their charms.

Working with such delicate and ephemeral things as flowers and plants is also a challenge in itself, but that is also a main part of their charming beauty for Makoto. When asked about his favourite varieties to work with, he explained that to him each plant has its charm, so he cannot choose a specific one.

“Flowers change depending on the season, their growing land conditions as well the people who are around. I need to feel the vitality of flowers; only at that point can I decide whether to use them or not for my works.”

Botanical Sculpture x in Bloom project Sea,
 © Azuma Makoto, © amkk Project,
 photo: © Shiinoki Shunsuke

But that’s not all; even the relationship between humans and flowers is a topic Makoto loves to explore in his works. This bond is indeed a crucial part of Makoto’s philosophy as – in his words – not only do they accompany our lives from the moment of birth, weddings, and anniversaries, to funerals, but they embody the notion of beauty, strength, vitality, and ephemerality, being an eternal motif in the world of fashion and art crafts.

“My work is to bind humans and flowers together beautifully, and I am trying to reshape that sense in the contemporary and convey it to the world. As times have changed, the various needs of plants and flowers have increased, and I can foresee that these needs will become even stronger.”

When we discuss his works, Sculpture × In Bloom project – Sea #1 and Frozen Flowers 2023 are probably among the most mesmerising and impressive projects Makoto and his studio AMKK have developed over the past couple of years.

“Regarding Frozen Flowers”, an incredible sculpture of flowers covered in ice, 5 metres high, he explains

“I wanted to explore how flowers – under numberless ice layers – change their colours. I also sought how fresh flowers covered with ice showed their expression at their freezing point – a condition where fresh flowers would never exist in nature.”

And indeed, the result is a mind-blowing sculpture where the ice redesigns the flowers’ shapes and colours, creating an almost alien botanical creature. And something similar has been created by Makoto under the sea, for the Okinawa project. Here – he states – the buoyancy was a big problem. “As the floating power takes the flowers up and the wave hits the sculpture, it was hard to keep them in a specific place. However, we managed to express another unknown charm of flowers with more than boat-sized sculpture.” The result is almost a fantastical, mythological creature, a mermaid made of land-based plants, brought to life on the sea floor and moving along with the stream in a mystical dance.

Frozen Flowers, © Azuma Makoto, © amkk Project, photo: © Shiinoki Shunsuke

To him, every project has its memories, and it is an attractive moment.

“All projects, such as shooting flowers into the stratosphere or sinking flowers into the deep sea, have their challenges to execute, and there is never a project which I would be able to create easily.”

And this friction, this challenge is the core part of his art: Makoto expresses his artworks by ending a precious life of a flower which is already beautiful by existing in nature. He needs to take a further step, and “apply something to create a new appearance for the flowers, which people can’t see when they are in their natural state,” he says.

«I constantly seek what kind of “friction” will be created by installing flowers in an environment where flowers usually do not exist and discovering a new unknown aspect of the beauty of flowers. I enjoy bringing the various expressions that the plants show, the light and humidity conditions together, preparing for the very best moment to be photographed or exhibited.”

For Makoto and AMKK, flower art is above all capturing a moment – each instance of a flower’s life can express different charms. From the very beginning coming into the bud, blooming, and eventually decaying, every single moment is ephemeral and fascinating and has a different beauty in it. By looking at each flower, just like human beings have individual differences, no one is perfectly identical to another; their looks keep shifting and changing, and this is exactly the beauty that Makoto and AMKK studio capture in their artworks.

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