Air

Rei Naito Born 1961, Hiroshima, Japan Lives and works in Tokyo, Japan A tiny pillow of air, rendered in organza and thread, Rei Naito’s pillow for the dead 1998 offers symbolic comfort for the individuals who have no-one to remember their passing. The work is an extension of Being Called , a project Naito produced in response to the murals at Frankfurt’s Carmelite Monastery in 1997. Created by Jörg Ratgeb between 1474 and 1496, the murals depict the history of the Carmelite Order, including its persecution and migration throughout Europe. At the base of these murals, Naito placed 304 of her little pillows — one for each of the figures portrayed — illuminating them from below. While these exquisite pillows allude to the fates of the fleeing Carmelites as saints, martyrs and victims, they are also offered to the persecutors. In contrast to the 304 individual pillows produced for the Carmelite Monastery, Naito intended her pillow for the dead not only for the victims of persecution but also for the innumerable dead, in a broad sense. As with all of Naito’s work, it exhibits a sensitivity to the preciousness of the small object, an extreme attention to detail and finish, and an awareness of the interplay of artwork and setting. The artist often houses her fastidiously executed sculptures and drawings in purpose-built structures that she creates herself in flannel and organza, drawing on architecture and lighting as perceptual apparatuses that help stage the experience of the work for the viewer. Since 2001, the artist has presented her works under natural light. Here, the delicate pillow is presented alone, cradled by a bespoke pedestal. Whereas the pillows in the monastery set up a dialogue with Ratgeb’s murals, the single element of pillow for the dead highlights the absence of figures. Its solitary presentation extends and abstracts the notion of commemoration to potentially anyone whose suffering has gone unremarked. And yet, such is its compression of texture and space — and its allusive power as a metaphor for the fragility of existence — Rei Naito’s pillow for the dead implies an evocative architecture all its own. RK Rei Naito / Being Called 1997 (installation view, Karmeliterkloster, Frankfurt am Main, Germany 1997) (opposite) pillow for the dead 1998 103 102 Shared Shared