Inner Light - Floating Houseboat of Setouchi by Ryusuke Kido on Shodoshima

Hello everyone,
First, I want to apologize for the lack of posts this month, despite my July promise. I'm still in France, but I've had much less free time than I expected. In fact, even right now, my son is talking to me while I'm typing this. 🙂
Also, before I forget, you may have heard that Ghost, the platform hosting this newsletter, has recently joined the Fediverse, also known as the Open Social Web—a much more appropriate name, albeit a longer one. So, this blog/newsletter is now part of the Fediverse.
If you don't know what that means, you can find some explanations here (I may need to update a thing or two in that blog post), and I invite you to join.
If you know what that means, you can follow me there: @David@JapanArtIslands.com from your Open Social Web platform of choice (including, but not limited to, Ghost, Mastodon, Threads, Flipboard, WordPress.com, and even Bluesky with some workarounds).
There are still a few hiccups to sort out because this blog is self-hosted, but I won't bore you with the details.
All right, how about we talk about some art from the Setouchi Islands? What do you think?
Inner Light - Floating Houseboat of Setouchi by Ryusuke Kido on Shodoshima
There's only one artwork today. It's the only one I have time for, but it's fitting because this new piece for the Setouchi Triennale 2025 is quite isolated, far from the other art. I expect many foreign visitors to miss it.
It's located in Kusakabe Port, which used to be my favorite port on Shodoshima. Unfortunately, it closed a few years ago because not enough people used it. The company that managed the ferry was bought out by the company that manages the Ikeda ferry, and the port closed. It's sad, but most of Shodoshima's population lives in the western part of the island these days (Tonosho and Ikeda), and fewer and fewer people live in the eastern part. It's a shame, but that's life.
The location of the art is fitting: an abandoned boat in an abandoned port.
The boat is not in the water, though. It's on land and has been carved and sculpted by the artist. This gives the boat a "rotten" appearance while also making it appear alive. This is due to the organic appearance of the carvings and holes, as well as the fact that they allow air and light to reach parts of the boat that were previously inaccessible.
The former vehicle almost has a lived-in appearance, albeit probably not by humans.
It may not be the most amazing art in the area, but I think it's interesting enough to make a detour to see it. You'll probably need a car or a bike to do so—stopping at the bus stop means waiting two hours for the next bus or walking a couple of kilometers to the next artwork to the east, which is totally doable if you're healthy and it's not summer.
I don't have much else to add, so I'll let the pictures speak for themselves:







Ryusuke Kido's official website:

That's all for today.
As always, if you enjoyed this, please share it with your loved ones and contacts. If you haven't subscribed yet, I warmly invite you to do so.
I'll be in France for a few more days, so my next post will probably be from Japan in a little over a week. Maybe it will be about some summer art if I manage to see any? Who knows?
Stay tuned, and thanks for reading!
Link
Today, only one link from one of Megijima's new resident who tells you about her adopted island during the festival:
