Soul Foundry

Create my own original shape

 
http://tokoshiiki.com

Evolving....

I wrote this song just around one year ago. It just came to me.
But sadly it has never been played in front of people, so far.
I could luckily make this video I attached with such a great creative partner friend, Eric...
but there was no chance to play.

...However, one year later, now, interestingly this song started evolving... bigger and higher, far more beautiful with other four people...
How amazing moment to feel that? When I jammed first, I could not hold tears in my eyes.
I wrote and quietly waited for one year and someone I can trust their sense of music see the video and loved it and brought this up again... This is............ such an unexpected gift............... to me.

Under the cold winter days condition, I needed this kind of wide open creative moment....
Can't wait to share re-arranged this song with you.

Toko

http://tokoshiiki.com

Do you see what I see?

(self-portrait, right after swimming)

Being in the water and just concentrated on being zero.
Felt better...


Long time ago (around more than 15 years ago), my ex-coworker told me I may die somewhere in water.  After the work, on a train to go back home, she suddenly mentioned about it.

"Water....  Be careful to be in water." She said softly. I didn't get what she tried to tell me.
"There was someone in your family who was dead in water...  Long time ago...  That's also your fate."  
"Is this some kind of joke?" I laughed at and asked her but she said, "I feel it."
She looked so serious. I could not ask anything more than that.
After the day, I have never seen her.
... and I forgot about the story and also about her little by little...


I was used to swim a lot. When I was a child, I more preferred  to be in water than being on ground. I didn't have many things that I was proud of but drawing/ painting, and swimming were special things to me.
But for a while - very long time, I stopped. Not because of the story - I may die in water, but, much earlier time than I have heard the story, after having my first menstruation and my body shape was changing into a "lady's" from a "girl's, I felt not comfortable to go to swim. So gradually being far from any swimming pool then started again more than 15 years later.


...Before moving to the US, I went to Shikoku and swam and also just floated in the ocean for a while. I was alone in the sea.  I recalled the story, "You will die somewhere in water" when I was floating in the ocean. But, I knew it was not the time yet to die for me. Rather, I was even feeling like soon to be born... I was holding my legs with both arms and kept spinning in the seawater. It was very nice... nice memory.  (Still Shikoku is one of my favorite places in the Earth after the trip. I must go back there...)


Now, I swim regularly again. The beginning of the last year, I started again since I got to know the gym has a salted water pool. This is very nice. I go there in order to purify myself and be free...

In the water, usually there is no distracting thought. (Oh, only one time I cried in the water. But just one time.)  Being able to be close to zero. Feel freer and freer.


In general, I feel "live my life" is very similar to "swim in a river." Sometimes there is a nice flow of the water. Sometimes I have to swim in an upstream. Every once in a while, take a break and look around... and meet, talk, and even fall in love with people who is swimming in the same flow and same speed. Maybe swim together for a while and/or say "See you again" or "Good luck" ... and keep swimming. Choose my own direction.  And, someday, I'll get the sea - usually called as "death".  The time must come, for each one of us.  Until the moment, I just keep swimming in this river. No try, just do.


...I thought something like that (again) today, after swimming...
And I thought it is not bad to think, now. Yes.

Toko
 
http://tokoshiiki.com

This Moment

"Now"

Learning past and finding futures
...and take time to appreciate this moment. 
   I am here, now.

Being on the river flow, how much close to the sea?
    (...am I swimming well?)

Accepting past and traveling to futures
...and take time to enjoy this moment.
   You are here, now.

What can you see and hear? No fear? No tear?
How do you feel?

Embracing pasts and constructing futures
...and take time to celebrate every single moment of life.
   Yes.  We are here, "Now".


*******

The beginning of this year, I wrote about "Let it go".
Interestingly, the words stand for this year, I think.

Thank 2010, Hello 2011...
 Keep moving forward...

Toko


http://tokoshiiki.com

Rain rain rain

When I was young, oh yes I remember, when I was 14 years old, on a rainy day, I wanted to melt into the rain around myself and flowed together somewhere. I wondered "why and how am I still here?"
I clearly remember this because I wrote a poem about it. It was really bitter one...

Now, I'm here, somehow got this time and space and looking at rain drops were falling down and creating circles...
Anyway...  Life is an unexpected story... somehow continue...

Toko

http://tokoshiiki.com

No more...

Never be alone because I notice that you are there...
Never be lonely because I always with you.
Don't have to be so scared. Yes... now you can feel it. Right?

Let it go... Let it fly...


I don't even know how long I took to get here.
... and got to know you are there – the forest in me...

Life is... wow... so bitter, so sweet, so funny, so bizarre, so cute, so ugly, and so beautiful. All those mix together.  And, I can say...

"Life is... wonderful... still."
A miracle to be here.   Now.

So, keep moving on...

Toko

http://tokoshiiki.com

Photo news update.

I got this notification yesterday. I am very thankful for this... because this series do not complete yet and I felt this notification is an encouragement for me... This series is the work that I have been working on since last Fall. This whole process is very important to me. Like I mentioned, this is not completed yet (this is a part of the whole series) but anyway, I'm glad to show them.  Now, I started preparing for new part. Very exciting to move forward, again...Yes, this is my photographic journey.

*****
"2010 International Photography Awards Announces Winners of the Competition" 
(from the Press Release)
Toko Shiiki was awarded an Honorable Mention in People - Other category for the winning entry "Midlife. – Chapter 1"


Entry Description: This is my story of midlife awakening. The concept for this photographic project arrived while I was constructing some egg shell forms; In the middle of a journey, I'm in-between birth and death. After long conversation about "midlife" with my husband, age 42, I felt – very clearly – that I must do this photo project with him. This project is not a fantasy for me, it is an inner-life documentary. Poised between now and now, the series continues.
winner's gallery

*****

Actually, these images on the gallery are not all from the series. I uploaded the images from the Chapter 1 to my website: http://tokoshiiki.com/midlife_chapter1/index.html

Also, two of my images from the series are scheduled to be published in the portfolio section of the September 2010 issue of Photographer's Forum Magazine. If you have a chance to see the magazine, please check it out. And let me know what you see...  

Thank you... Toko

*****
IPA:
The 2010 International Photography Awards received nearly 15,000 submissions from 103 countries across the globe. IPA is a sister-effort of the Lucie Foundation, where the top three winners are announced at the annual Lucie Awards gala ceremony. The Foundation's mission is to honor master photographers, to discover new and emerging talent and to promote the appreciation of photography. Since 2003, IPA has had the privilege and opportunity to acknowledge and recognize contemporary photographers' accomplishments in this specialized and highly visible competition. Visit www.photoawards.com for more details.


http://tokoshiiki.com