Artist's Statement

Eugenie Kawabata refuses to accept waste as the end of a material’s life. In her hands, discarded textiles are reborn as vividly coloured, richly textured sculptural forms that pulse with energy and intent. Her work doesn’t simply recycle – it reimagines, creating objects that ask us to look again at what we throw away, and what stories lie hidden in the fibres of the overlooked.

What distinguishes Kawabata’s practice is the way she fuses the hand-made with the experimental. Stitching, dyeing, and painting collide with resin-based processes to produce objects that appear both organic and other-worldly. They feel like relics from another civilisation, or specimens unearthed from the forest floor, oscillating between design object and sculptural artefact. Kawabata’s work is not simply about aesthetics; it is about value. By transforming waste into objects of cultural significance, she reframes the way we understand material, labour, and ecology. Kawabata’s work feels equally urgent as it does as enchanting, reminding us of the fragility of environments and the resilience of life that continues to thrive within them.