Natsumi Ito
Born in Japan, based in Tokyo
Experiencing Prehistoric Wall Paintings and Tracing Human Presence
In Madhya Pradesh, I visited three prehistoric rock art sites, including a UNESCO World Heritage site. The walls were covered with stylized human figures—round heads atop line-drawn bodies—rendered like stick figures. This body of work I created during my residency in Khajuraho takes “embodiment” as a key theme throughout. For me, embodiment refers to traces of human life: the signs that someone once lived, moved, and acted.
Inside the caves, I encountered hand stencils and finger-dragged drawings—evidence of direct human contact. Some images showed people dancing and playing instruments, suggesting that as far back as 20,000 years ago, people lived in highly social communities. As I absorbed these scenes, I was reminded of something found frequently in Japan’s own Jomon archaeological sites: small, carbonized cookie-like objects made from a mixture of acorn flour, animal blood, and honey. I began to imagine that prehistoric people in India might have prepared similar food in their daily lives, decorating it with intention, just like they did with their wall paintings.
This led me to picture a young girl in prehistoric India decorating cookies with vivid designs and giving them as gifts to friends and neighbors. Inspired by this imagined scene, I created a series of cookie-like terracotta works shaped like fictional scripts. The anonymous, ageless, and genderless stick figures found in the rock art resonated with me personally and gave form to this imagined girl—a figure through which I could connect my own sense of embodiment to that of ancient people.
Experiencing this landscape of central India—before the invention of writing—deepened my curiosity about the Brahmi script, said to be the oldest writing system in India. In this exhibition, I present drawings and paintings developed by tracing the forms of Brahmi letters engraved into the sandstone walls of a 1,000-year-old temple across from the residency where I stayed in Khajuraho. Alongside these works are terracotta sculptures—resembling cookies shaped like imaginary letters—created using local Khajuraho clay and fired in a traditional potter’s kiln.
Through the act of touching and tracing the forms of these ancient letters—whose shapes subtly shifted with each new dynasty—I reflected on how scripts carry authority and power: the ability to record, to remember, to grant or deny access to knowledge.
My physical experience of the jungle and waterfalls—environments in which prehistoric people once lived—led me to contemplate how the body and the tools used for mark-making may have influenced the evolving forms of Brahmi. I hope to continue exploring the relationships among body, tool, and material through my tactile artistic practice. The themes of indigenous customs, tools, and embodiment will likely remain central to my work going forward.
Diary from the Artist Residency at Last Ship (for Open Studio)
《Exercise for practicing unfamiliar characters 2024, oil colored pencil and acrylic on paper, terracotta, turmeric, marker on paper clay
I am glad I chose this location for my studio. It offers a good view of the temple, and more importantly, my worktable is positioned at almost the same coordinates as the dining table in the garden. I could feel the presence of people passing by, eating, and conversing, and even the insects and mongooses that frequently wandered into the room. In other words, this studio felt seamlessly connected to the garden. Thus, I perceived my studio as part of the garden and an extension of the dining table. Like a garden ecosystem where specific species and fungi coexist, each theme in my work coexisted and expanded within this time, spending time together as if sharing a meal. I aim to present the process of my associations during this time.
Introduction
First and foremost, I must clarify that this is not an attempt to seek archaeological legitimacy. Unfortunately, I did not have enough time to gather objective materials on Brahmi script. Most of the sources are broad images from the internet, and I have not yet formed a systematic thought process to compile references from papers or books into footnotes.
I always explain to people that my works, especially drawings, are like a diary. This text is also a diary-like piece meant to assist my memory. The themes are broadly divided into eight categories based on events and inspirations. The process of digestion by the clay and the microorganisms living in it that have accompanied me since I came here, ancient Indian scripts found in the ruins, the stick figures of Bhimbetka, the light and blue of Bhopal and Sanchi, the body balance and horizon based on the pictorial script-like paintings in Kalinjar Fort, the saffron and pistachio cake I received from Sureka during Diwali, and the idea of capturing the curves of letters as window designs, imagining what people have reflected upon and what kind of scenery they have seen through the window of amulets adorned with deified letters.
Upon entering, on the left side of the entrance of my studio are vertically arranged printed materials on copy paper. This is a comparative chart of Brahmi-based scripts (Indian scripts) showing the approximate evolution from the oldest script, Brahmi, to the Devanagari script currently used for Hindi. To the right is a comparison of numeral shapes, and below that, the top chart shows Brahmi numerals before the invention of the zero symbol, and the chart below it shows numerals after its invention.
Moving to the shelf, on the top are terracotta parts, which are created with overlapping keywords like "fossils of presence," "portable murals," and "charred prehistoric cookies." The second shelf holds drawings that were too strong in shape to display elsewhere. Since coming to India, I've often mistaken plastic waste piles or collapsed shacks for cows, and I feel I've become accustomed to cows. Even my poor eyesight adapts to the environment, seeing "cow illusions."
On the third shelf, I often found flies and moths drowning in my drinking water in the studio, so I drew pictures for them. The resin surrounding them is made by casting and crushing market-bought dishes. There's a beautiful feather I received from Ajju in the jungles of Kalinjar Fort. Below that are beautiful stones picked up from the Kalinjar river and semi-transparent agate given to me by Ajju. By the way, the reverently placed "Temple of Khajuraho" book, I only read two pages. The cow dung at the bottom right is one of my favorites but displaying it prominently would make everything look like dung, so I discreetly placed it here. The orange ribbon has a basmati rice pattern, and initially, due to my preconceived notions of rice shapes, I couldn't draw long rice, so it ended up looking like Japanese rice.
Additionally, I want to refer to all the sculptures made of outdoor resin, mixed with turmeric, white paper clay, star-shaped macaroni, and small stones picked from the banks of Brihaspati Kund and the garden of Last Ship. I insist that these are all about tracing letters. I insist that this is a practice to recognize letters. As a child, repeating the writing of characters in practice books until I could write well was a work connecting hand movements with the symbolism of letters.
Through real-time images sent by friends, I confirmed that the moon has the same shape but different place of phases in my home country and the place I'm currently in at the same time, knowing that I understand the shape of the horizon's position. To connect the horizontal physicality of letters with the way we, clinging to the surface of the earth, have come to know up, down, left, and right based on the outline of the earth, I trace the ancient letters that are no longer used, kneading soil and turmeric.
About the sink area
The shadows of the bamboo sculptures hanging from the ceiling fall beautifully on the walls, so I hesitated to create more sculptures around the sink and add more shadows. However, I always found the layers of space around the sink and the step near the wall beautiful, so I decided to incorporate a bit of a story into this corner. I am also very fond of the terracotta-colored floor that matches the sink area and the concrete color that matches the shape of the mirror.
Regarding the mirror, there are too many myths that can be cited, so I will skip that for now. But I will note that I love how the temple reflects in the mirror when you look into it or take photos, creating a borrowed scenery effect similar to traditional East Asian gardens.
The cube-shaped small box on the left side of the mirror contains cushioning material made from shredded handwritten notes, business documents, and promotional flyers that I liked too much to use in my works. I might chemically treat the cardboard to keep cockroaches away and display it on my shelf at home.
I am fond of Georges Bataille's idea (roughly interpreted) that prehistoric people invented drawing when they saw a line traced in mud with their fingers as a bison and began to draw from there. Inspired by this non-archaeological perspective, I created a sculptural version of it. Adding another element to one part suddenly creates space around the part, just like when drawing. I want to know where the boundary of sculpture starts, just as we question where a single line can start a picture and where space begins on a plane.
I intended to leave intentional finger marks on the terracotta, but in the end, the glossy, fresh marks left by the potter on the raw clay at the potter's house were the most beautiful. The potter told me that they have been potters for five generations. According to Raju, the beginning of pottery naturally involved items related to meals, such as water jars and utensils, and later on, combining them with bamboo and firing them created dwellings. This practice has continued for tens of thousands of years in this region. Although the potter's house was entirely unfamiliar to me, it felt strangely nostalgic, as if my prehistoric physical memory, the memory in my hands, was being revived.
Now, whether it's the last or the first, the terracotta pieces placed on the worktable remind me of crunchy sweets like churros. The stones resemble peanut chocolates. This idea began with my imagination that a prehistoric little girl painted on food, rather than on rock walls, to give drawings to her friends. I believe there must have been prehistoric people who decorated food, though none of these decorations have survived to the present day. However, I cannot imagine what kind of designs they might have created, so I drew inspiration from the murals and ancient scripts I saw in India.
Conclusion
I want to say that what I created here is a part of the time spent here and will continue to connect to other places in the future. I plan to dismantle the bamboo sculptures and refine the rough textures and part of zip ties, and the clay pieces will be joined with saffron to continue tracing letters and become several sculptures in my room in Japan. Since I have a habit of leaving memories in the places I leave, I decided to keep this diary here to connect the pieces of time together this time. This way, I can convey the thoughts that emerged in this studio, integrated with the garden, to my future self back in my room.
Appendix
A diary entry I forgot when I wrote, but I think it is relevant for the open studio, so I include it.
"Landscapes Grown on the Foundation of People Shaped by the Addictive Nature of Living"
First of all, about why I became interested in the evolution of ancient script forms, which is the major theme of my work during this residency. Especially, I became interested in the Siddham script, the predecessor of the Devanagari script currently used for Hindi (although I eventually focused on the Brahmi script, the source form of ancient Indian scripts).
Personally, this interest started when I, a Christian, participated in Buddhist rituals for the first time due to my marriage. Tombstones, wooden grave tablets, and sutras were inscribed with Siddham script, which I couldn't read at all. Everyone chanted the sutra together, but I had no idea what they were saying or what was written, and I was greatly surprised by my own ignorance.
After the ritual, I asked my husband and in-laws about the meaning, and they told me, "We don't really know the content either. Everyone chants it without understanding. It's just how it is." This further astonished me.
When I asked the monk why the grave tablets were long, thin boards and why they were inscribed with Siddham script, he said, "Hmm, there's a tower-like structure at the top of the stupa in Sanchi, India, where it is said Buddha's relics are enshrined. It's said that the shape of the wooden tablets imitates this structure. I've also trained in India many times, but no one knows the true origin anymore. It's just something we use because it's decided as such. The Siddham script is also too ancient to trace back." However, the monk mentioned that during the Great East Japan Earthquake, many people were swept away, and those who survived felt a sense of peace when they saw the Siddham script on the grave tablets while commemorating the deceased. "So, I believe in it as 'just the way it is,' even though the origin and reason are no longer known," he said.
He also mentioned that the script itself represents gods, and I found it endearing to imagine gods living within the forms of letters. The flowing lines of the script are beautiful and calming to look at, much like gazing at the clear sky through a window each day. Through the window of amulets, a window that lets light in, people have been reflecting the expansive landscapes within themselves and have been viewing them for ages.
I want to see the beautiful landscapes that such people imagined. In my work, which is partly an occult fiction story, I weave together the appearances of people and landscapes freely, and through the process of creating them as works, I fondly recall the actions of the people I observed living their lives since I arrived here. The beauty I feel comes from reflecting on things they cannot stop doing, even if they wanted to.
This becomes a habit that shapes the person and eventually becomes their unique time. The overlapping of time within the waves created by the actions of these people approached me with the presence of cultural physicality.
The persistence of trying to shoo away flies, even though they know they can't stop them, laying stones diligently to adjust misaligned furniture, continuing what could be seen as absurdly extreme behavior, and having to keep going despite it being incomprehensible to others—this is what being alive is all about.
Removing shoes before entering temples, the vivid pink painted on the sides of women's feet, the people sitting directly on the concrete floor chatting, the sensations of the stone houses beneath their feet, the people effortlessly carrying bamboo ladders, the cars and bikes elegantly avoiding cows sitting in the middle of the road, the voices and clapping hands guiding cows away from the market—all these cultural physicalities, the relationship between people and the town, and how the town's spaces are constructed, have left a strong impression on my heart. These postures and spaces evoke humor and sometimes anxiety in the viewer, which is why they are flexible, not fixed habits born from being alive.
The Splendor of Indic Scripts, edited by Kazuhiko Machida, Hakusuisha
Illustrated Guide to Asian Scripts, edited by the Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, Kawade Shobō Shinsha
References
Works completed and framed after returning to Japan
These include monotype prints showing the evolution of character forms by dynasty, cited from scholarly works on Brahmi script, as well as a chart tracing the transformation of Brahmi numerals into Arabic numerals.
