Shinto Animist Religion Guides Artist Sayaka Ganz with Reclaimed Creations

Sayaka

Your PI could mean the world to you. Get ready for your positive imprint. Hello, this is Catherine host of your positive imprint. The variety show featuring people all over the world whose positive actions are inspiring positive achievements, exceptional people rise to the challenge. Music by the talented Chris Nole. As always a huge thank you to Chris, for permission to use some of his music on this podcast, including

elevated intentions in which he composed for your positive imprint. Check out Chris and his music at, ChrisNole.com, C H R I S N O L E. Follow me on Facebook and Instagram, your positive imprint connect with me on LinkedIn. Sign up for email updates from my. Yourpositiveimprint.com. And thanks for listening on apple podcast, Google podcast, Spotify, Amazon music, or whoa, your favorite podcast platform.

Thank you. Your positive imprint. What's your PI?

Reclaimed creations, and I absolutely love this phrase, reclaimed creations.

Well, Sayaka Ganz from Japan is an international artist who helps to reduce your waste, our waste. She grew up with Shinto, and she's going to explain that today here on the show. But as I, as I was saying, She believes artists of today's era have a responsibility to bring more of the natural world back into my life;

back into your life. I think that is just a fabulous philosophy. Well, today, she reclaims creations and reduces waste from our landfills, from the oceans, from where it shouldn't be, and creates beautiful art. For me, when I first saw her whale, it was extraordinary. But then the whale, the dolphins, they talked to me.

It just felt that way because I could almost feel the presence of the whale and the presence of the dolphins and the joy for life, but also a sadness. And that is what Sayaka hopes for in her artwork, is that relationship with her pieces. And so, She's here today and I met her at a museum exhibit and it was pretty much right before the world shut down.

And I am so glad to have her here today on the show to share her beliefs, her art, her culture, her positive imprints.

Welcome to your positive imprint.

I was born in Japan and I grew up well, so I spent my kindergarten years and then up to third grade I was in Japan and I grew up in the suburbs. There is a park near where I, I used to live within five minutes walking distance.

That is a fairly large park. It's known for having fireflies Japanese fireflies, which Oh, beautiful. They're becoming more and more rare. They're pretty endangered, I think, unfortunately because unlike the fireflies here that live in the fields with grass. The fireflies in Japan, they need really clean stream of water.

And because the water is getting polluted in so many places, they're becoming more and more rare.

My parents moved a lot

but as a child, I really did not like , to move. I didn't want to go to another country. I wanted to stay where I was comfortable with my friends. When I was in third grade, we moved to Brasil. Wow.

It's like the farthest place from Japan

Japan is such a small island , community and Tokyo is a huge city, but still Japanese people the population is still really predominantly Japanese and especially back then, we didn't get exposed to someone from another country very much.

We had a next door neighbor who I think was from the United States, and that was actually , very rare. My parents would tell me a few words of English and we would always try to say something to them and they'll come over to the, and talk to us for a little bit, which I never understood anything they were saying us.

And that was like extent of my experience with a foreign country and then we thrown this whole new place in Brazil. But in Sao Paulo at the time there was a full-time Japanese school because there is a pretty big Japanese community in Brasil. And including The immigrant population from Japan, they had moved over to Brazil long time ago.

And also around that time I think there had been cases where in Mexico or in another South, south American country, there were children of Japanese government officials being kidnapped.

And so my parents were, and all the Japanese parents were very protective of us. So we we were not allowed to go out by ourselves. My parents would drive me everywhere if I wanted to go and visit with a friend, if they live like just in another block, they would have to take me there. And so we, we lived, , very sheltered lives.

I have two brothers. One is three years younger than me, so he was six when we moved to Brazil and the other was born in Brazil. My parents decided that they wanted me to learn English and learn different cultures. So, transfer to an American school, like halfway into my experience in Sao Paulo.

So, so I move, I transferred and yeah, that was a bit of a shock. I mean, now thinking back, I learned English there, so that's been very useful to me,. But but at the time it was pretty hard and especially for, , someone didn't like change, didn't wanna get thrown into new environment.

I think the move back to Japan was harder to me, harder for me because, you know, at the time I was 13, so , so, you know, it was, and I was the weird kid who had been to Brazil

So, yeah, it, it was kinda hard for me.

And because that memory of having a hard time in Japan was so fresh in my mind. So I was just not going back to Japan. I wasn't doing that. That's how I ended up in the States.

But even when I did have friends, I had a hard time feeling completely accepted. Mm-hmm. into the group and. So I think that's part of the reason why I like to give homes to things that are discarded because it's really soothing To me,

Her students have come and gone, but Sayaka finds joy in having students in her life that she can mentor in their artwork.

One of Sayaka's goals is to bring more of the natural world into your home, into our lives, into the presence of communities. You have been sharing your talent with the world, but also your Shinto and I think that that's extraordinary because it's not just about the art and it's not just about the waste.

Our parents would tell us if you throw something away in trash that aren't ready to be thrown out, that still have useful life left in them. Then these things, these objects, like pencils, erasers, or some tools that are still useful. They're crying in the trash at night.

Or, if we throw away food, food waste. Then there is this ghost called Nante mottainai is it's a Japanese phrase that's means what a waste basically. What a waste. It's so wasteful. It's a shame. And this ghost, mottainai ghost comes out in the middle the night and tells you that you're a bad person, I guess

And it's like a very scary thought with the children. And but it's also I think, a worldview that makes us learn that everything in this world has a spirit and everything can also potentially be your friend at the same time. If you treat something badly, then they feel sad, but at the same time, I think if you reverse that, if you're nice to the objects around you, then they're all your friends.

It can be like practice in the more formal setting. And so in Japan we have shrines that are Shinto shrines with the priest and the priest dress traditionally.

So when I see something that is thrown out that Lost their owners for some reason. I feel really sad for them. And I also grew up with my mother doing all kinds of craft hobbies. And I'm very used to using her scrap materials and making something of my own, kind of imitating what she does, but in my own way.

So these things kind of combined and I, I've always loved puzzles, so , I just love working with found objects, working with reclaimed materials. And what I do is I turn them around and look at them, how they connect how they look when two items combined to make one shape and I experimented basically to get to the plastic sculptures.

But before I started making plastic sculptures that you saw at the museum I, I, well, I was welding. Wow. And that's how I started making animal sculptures. I took a one day metal welding fabrication workshop when I was a junior in college, . And back then my major was printmaking.

But I just fell in love with this process of welding because I was digging through a pile of scrap metal which is, A scrap of a scrap because these are , not from a junkyard, but from a pile of rejects that other students had, , collected from places and then , their projects didn't work out or they cut off a piece and the piece that they didn't want when they did the pile.

So this pile of scrap metal that nobody wanted and I could gather them and make animal forms and oh my gosh, it was so much fun. I just fell in love with doing that.

I recently completed a Native American chief that lived and fought with the Americans

And but he is very not well known because he was a more of a quiet leader. And so, this organization they help people with some kind of disadvantage, like a criminal record or a disability or an addiction record history to, to get a job.

And so they do that by providing training and getting clothes for them to wear for the interview and showing them how to interview and how to be reliable employees .

And they commissioned me to make this sculpture of Chief Blue jacket. The challenge was that there's no surviving photograph of him. And there's also this myth that he was a white person that got adopted into this tribe at a young age. And it was debunked from, from DNA evidence of the descendants.

But so a lot of what I find online, there's so much inaccurate information out there. And and so I ended up contacting the Shawnee Tribe. Because I, I really needed to know what's believable , what's true and what's not, and what images I can use. But I got the descendants.

And so, he gave me some images that, that were more accurate to the knowledge of the tribe. And they were paintings, not photographs, they were very helpful. And then he also sent me some photographs of not chief Blue jacket, but I think his son or his grandson.

I called the organization Blue Jacket and I was all excited. I was like, Oh my gosh. I, I made contact with the descendant and, and then they decided to invite the descendants to the ribbon cutting . They invited a whole big group and paid for their flight and hotel and they all came.

July 15th,

What a tribute. And also how wonderful it was that you were culturally sensitive and that you took your time to make sure that you were getting it right. And that is commendable,

Where do you build these, because that whale is not life size, but it's huge.

Your artwork is trying to relay some sort of, not just a message, but a hope for whomever is looking at it, can become emotionally involved at that moment of looking at the art piece.

And for me, when I saw the whale, especially the whale and then the spoons, you had a lot of the spoons inside, that was powerful for me. Just knowing that that intelligent animal is swimming, living, not just swimming, because swimming is recreation for us, right? Is living in the ocean amongst all of that trash.

And that, for me was just a, as happy as that whale is being able to have freedom. I was sad. And I think that's good because you, you wanna get people not just involved in the art, but you also want to have them leave with, how am I going to make the world better as a community?

It's, I think it's all in you and whatever you already know, the sculpture can make this contact with you and bring out whatever you are ready to address. When I make a horse, what I'm focused on is their movement because I think I used to take riding lessons as a child and the memory is still so fresh in my, my body.

I still remember what it felt like to be on a galloping horse. And there is such a joy and feeling of the air moving around your body, moving through the hair, and it's all about the fascination of this movement. But these plastic objects, I think they each bring their own history into the work.

And when you look at them, it's like a unique blend. And you know, some people interpret it as ironic. Some people tell me, well maybe plastic waste shouldn't be presented in a way that's so beautiful. But to me I feel like we created these plastic objects because we need them. And and us trying to distance ourselves from that, it's not really very healthy because it's like rejecting ourselves our needs in some ways.

But if we can learn to really value them even more, then we are. Going to try not to waste so much, and we are going to try not to overproduce what we don't need.

People come to me telling me that, Oh, this exhibit has really changed my view about plastics and their potential and, and how we are harming the environment. And I think whatever this person received from the show, it's something that was already inside of them.

It has broken down into microplastic, which we know that's all it's going to do is continue to break down into microplastic.

So we don't have extensive waste and to not continually use the plastic, but to find other means. You're removing plastic from the oceans from, and not literally, but you're keeping it out of the oceans, you're keeping it out of landfills, you're keeping it out of water systems,

now of course, it's, it's not gonna be sustainable as a whale forever because eventually that plastic is gonna start to wear. But yes, for, but maybe by that time we will have figured out what we can do. Maybe somebody will invent something

And then , someone else might invent something that will allow these plastics to go back into the cycle of nature because I think, you know, because of my Shinto belief, I really believe that these plastic objects, they have been suspended outside of their cycle of nature because of the way we synthesize this raw material.

Which, I mean, they came from nature, but like right now, Earth is having an indigestion because we made it into something else, , . So, you know, we just have to return it to, to the earth in a way that's digestible. And I feel we should be able to figure that out.

that's, that's a great visual. And there is somebody out there that is going to invent it, whether it's during our lifetime or not. I hope it's going to be soon.

Sayaka, do you have a favorite sculpture of yours that you have done that talks to you more than any of the others?

The horses. I really love the horses also because I think because of my childhood memory It just brings so much joy in my body just looking at them. And, but at the same time, they don't talk to me the way the whale does. The whale has such a beautiful to me like a very feminine energy, the great mother.

Sadness is erupting within the ecosystems around the world for animals. And we're causing it, Your art certainly definitely has a place in the museum so that people can look to the future and say, What can I do?

Why did you want to use Reclaimed Creations? That is so beautiful.

What do I do? What do I do know, trying to describe my animals? Is it something about animals? Is it something with plastic? But really, because I also welded and I still continue to do that, I make metal animals. And recently I've been making human figures as well out of scrap metal.

So I didn't want to limit myself with just plastics. And my interest really is in all kinds of reclaimed materials. It can be wood, it can be plastic, it can be metal. But I'm always drawn to things that other people have used and discarded. So that just seemed like the thread that runs through all of my work.

And I've designed some of them to break down into sections to ship, but there's only so much I can do. And if I have brake line that's like a straight vertical line, it really interferes with the sense of movement I'm trying to create. So it, it just means like there's no real efficient way to transport them.

Can protect them. So, I mean, and now with with Covid, I think shipping industry has changed quite a bit and it's it's a lot more expensive to ship things nowadays. It continues to be a challenge. There have been times when I've instead of shipping a big box, I've carried a big box with me on the airplane.

And to check a big box in is a lot cheaper sometimes than to ship it overseas. I can , take at least one big sculpture with me, . Yeah, you just gotta be creative with shipping options.

Sayaka,, this has been so much fun having you on the show, and I love your philosophy. You do have a message and it is a happy message because there's hope. You want people to feel empowered. What are your last inspiring words?

And I think guilt is not a very useful kind of emotion. So my advice I can give to people I think is that you don't have to be perfect in. , practicing sustainable lifestyle it's very important for the sustainability in your life to be sustainable to your life at the same time. I, I don't want my viewers to go home feeling, so burden with guilt.

That's why it's important for my work to be beautiful and happy because I, I want, I want people to feel happy.

I want us all to be joyful and make inspired actions that are helpful to the environment. And I think we can all do it in a way that's really fun.