This Page Contains Sculptures made by Royden Mills out of his first Professional Sculpture Studio in Shikaoi Hokkaido , Japan , 1991-1993
https://www.town.shikaoi.lg.jp/
“”Nakamura” …When we first began our two year period of life in Japan I had just turned down an invitation to do post graduate work at the Royal College of Art in London and time working in Sir Anthony Caro’s studio. We moved to a very rural center of the Northern-most Island of Japan instead of accepting those British opportunities. I went because the love of my life had been asked there and I went because I felt kinship with philosophies I had read about and I also thought I might become changed in unpredictable ways. The master potter Furiyasan at the toge Centre in Shikaoi cho invited me to use a table in his studio and it was so generous of him. The series of clay sculptures were very good for me and surprisingly Tony Caro wrote to me once a month or so (by hand) encouraging me to use the time to make sculpture.
“Shima”
“Tokidoki”
“Tzukue” clay
Mr. Sakaguchi came to me one day saying that there was an old house that was being torn down and I could have the wood for free if I carried it away and by then the people in the small town all knew me and so they allowed me to use a half of an old garage at a very beautiful game farm. It was unheated and all I could use was hand tools.
i learned a little about Japanese wooden notches because the old house had been built like all Japanese buildings, to resist earth quakes. I began to try to do abstractions based on the personality of the people I met…rather than based on their appearance. This was a sculpture of my friend Mr. Okabe.
“Mr.Sakaguchi”. Is a friendly and gregarious and very open man who is larger than life and still has all the grace of great Japanese traditions.
“Mr. Matsuberra “ treated us with gentle balanced care and created conversation that was quiet and minimal but like being comfortably seated in a quiet corner where one can hear and is in no rush to leave.
“Mr.Sunaga” was extremely kind and elegant very traditionally Japanese on one level but beyond the surface there was a dynamism and unorthodoxy that made him such a great leader!!
I made 32 sculptures in two years and had my first professional solo exhibition in Japan
This was my first Professional Studio in my Career in
Shikaoi, Hokkaido, Japan 1991-1993 no heat a little electricity and many hours of hand labour trying to make work that meant something of value to me in my Japanese community of friends and still challenge what I admired about my friend Sir Anthony Caro.