URUSHI PROJECT 2025

Jun’ichiro ISHII + Ryuji Onari + Mizuki Kajihara with Rio Hashimoto

KIKA cas is pleased to present “URUSHI PROJECT 2025: To live pleasurably amidst a world of sorrow, or to live sorrowfully amidst a world of pleasure" from December 27, 2025 to February 1, 2026.

URUSHI PROJECT is a collective formed in 2021 comprising three artists with diverse backgrounds: Jun’ichiro ISHII, a contemporary artist who specializes in site-specific installations; Ryuji Onari, a lacquer artist who explores traditional lacquer techniques and materials through a contemporary lens; and Mizuki Kajihara, a conceptual artist reimagining symbols primarily through musical structures. The collective explores sustainable ways of living in society through practices that merge traditional crafts and cultures with contemporary art. Through the framework of SDGs, they have particularly focused on the contrast between the rate of human consumption and the rate of growth in natural resources. Marking five years since the collective began, this nineteen-day exhibition also features guest artist Rio Hashimoto, a recent MFA graduate from KCUA. Hashimoto explores the boundaries between aesthetic identification and repulsion by juxtaposing techniques that deviate from the traditional system of beauty in Japanese lacquerware.