“What can I do to make that stone Buddha be seen as a venerable presence that feels more solemn and yet also captivates people’s hearts?” When Yukio Takahashi of the Makomanai Takino Cemetery (Honorary Chairman of the public interest incorporated association Furusato Koen) approached me for advice, sights of the cave temples that I saw on my trips to Ajanta, India, and Dunhuang, China, immediately came to mind. The caves were created artificially by carving out the hard earth. When I stepped inside them, I could not make out the entirety of the caverns because of the darkness.
The Guest Critic is charged with suggesting a topic or theme that can be explored and debated for this special section of the Rail. On the occasion of the re-staging of Jenny Holzer’s 1989, architecturally encompassing piece at the Guggenheim, I have chosen the theme of site-specific Art. To my mind, Holzer’s Guggenheim project is one of the great site-specific works of my generation. It is also part of a larger history that has grown in some very interesting ways.