nahoko kojima cuts out an actual size whale 'shiro' from washi paper

artist nahoko kojima has unveiled her latest handmade japanese paper cut sculpture ‘shiro’ at the bangkok art and culture center. the artist’s largest piece, a life-sized depiction of a 32-meter-long blue whale, is her debut solo show in thailand.

all photos by solo kojima

kojima saw a whale in hawaii and, after months of drawings and research into the behavior and environment of the animal, she started to create her largest piece to date. the artist had japanese washi paper custom made for her in especially large sizes from a paper mill in japan and took months to cut the two flat sheets based on her drawings in her central london studio. kojima usually alters the designs as she cuts them, making it impossible to recreate similar works by digitizing and mechanizing drawings alone.

in order to ship the work to bangkok, the artist cut the finished sheet into clean squares which were rolled and then reassembled on site back into a single sheet. the key for kojima was that the art was made using one continuous drawing in order to maintain a link to traditional kirie (japanes art of papercutting) even when hung as sculpture.

designboom has received this project from our ‘DIY submissions‘ feature, where we welcome our readers to submit their own work for publication. see more project submissions from our readers here.

edited by: maria erman | designboom