Junichi Arai is indisputably one of the world’s foremost innovators in fabric and textile design. He was born in the city of Kiryu, Japan, an important center for textile production that boasts over 1,000 years of traditional silk weaving. As the sixth generation of a mill-owning family, Arai learned historical Japanese weaving techniques for obis and kimonos. In 1984 he founded the Nuno Corporation, a company and retailer wholly devoted to fabric – combining old practices with new technologies in innovative and unexpected ways.
This pleated textile was completed in 1986 and is truly an impressive and dazzling display of crimped silver metallic fabric, very reminiscent of tinfoil. Like other works in his oeuvre, Ohodedios is sculptural, and demonstrates the way in which the interaction of light and particular materials enliven and enrich the textile’s surface.
Jacqueline Sullivan is studying the History of Decorative Arts & Design at Cooper Hewitt / Parsons. She is a Master’s Fellow in the Textile Department.