Taiji Miyasaka

Taiji Miyasaka explores the interplay between light and darkness through installations and various media. His work emerged from his engagement with the materials and space of existing vernacular structures, and landscape in Eastern Washington State. He has also been influenced by the subtle contrast/harmony between light and darkness in traditional buildings in Kyoto, Japan, where he grew up. This fascination with light and darkness stems from studying the history and ideas of visual perception from the 16th century to 20th century, particularly James J. Gibson’s notion that the retinal image is not the basis of sight, but an ambient optic array to describe how we encounter and understand the environment.

Taiji received GAP 2016 funding for When darkness is light, a project originating from his design research. Taiji proposes to discover a series of spaces in Kyoto, Japan, which have an intense relationship between light and darkness, and document them in drawings, photographs, and interviews. He plans to exhibit the results of the documentation in the Carpenter Hall Gallery at Washington State University in summer 2017 and at other locations, including Japan. The documentation process will then serve as a foundation for design exploration of light and darkness in an installation project.