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I first started weaving soon after turning 40. It all began when I brought my only

son to a weaving class. After a short time observing my son practice, I was

inspired to take up weaving myself. From my first introduction to SAORI, I was

fascinated. I was eager to weave my own works. It felt as if my entire life had

prepared me for this moment.

 

Weaving is my meditation. When I sit in front of the loom, I see different parts of

myself manifest themselves in my work. Weaving became an introspective

activity for me, and a curiosity about how I subconsciously represented myself in

my pieces fueled my work. Initially I wove purely out of love for the art, but as my

experience grew I saw that my own vanity, ego, competitiveness, and pessimism

revealed themselves in my pieces. The forgotten negative feelings of my past

had returned into my life. The only way I could escape these feelings was to

continue weaving. Through this, I came to an understanding. The materials I

worked with would to speak to me, and my role was to translate them into the

weave. My negative thoughts, rather than being a hindrance, became part of my

work and my hands moved freely. My products are purely a result of the

materials as well as myself, and thus by accepting my works, I accepted myself.

It has been 12 years since I began weaving, and I am a completely different

person from when I began.

When I am asked for theme of my work, it is always difficult to think of a sufficient

response. As someone who takes inspiration from the materials, and simply

weaves to achieve that inspiration, there is no specific theme.

However, if pressed for an answer, I would say the overarching theme of my

work is life force.

The life force of the materials:

Pulsing from its larval body and spun thread by thread, an insect's cocoon, a

womb of silk from which the silk moth is born to flight.

The beating heart, hot blood, bones, flesh, and skin that produce wool, shorn

from bleating sheep and spun into yarn.

It’s vigorous roots pulling water from deep in the Earth and quickened by the sun,

fields of cotton and hemp strain for the sky.

The life force coursing through my spirit comes face to face with that of my

materials and gives birth to something entirely new.

I hope that you can feel and see this vital life force in my work.

 

 

 

Nobuko Tsuruta was born in Kamakura City and lived right in front of Kanagawa Modern Museum. During her elementary school years, she loved to visit the museum and even explored neighborhood galleries on her own. After winning an international student art competition and showing great promise, her mother offered to send her to art school, but Nobu instead chose to study economics at Rikkyo University. For eight years after college, Nobu worked in the fashion industry and after moving to New York with her husband, himself a talented interior architectural designer, When her son turned five, they attended a SAORI weaving workshop, sparking her interest in fiber arts. She began training regularly at Yukako Satone’s SAORI Studio uptown and soon began to develop her own style.

 

 

Exhibitions

2022 Duet exhibition I'm Uncomfortable.YouShould Be , Too. at Loop of the Loom Dumbo 

         for New York Textile Month

2022 Solo exhibition  I To To To Mo --- Thread and Friend   Kamakura city Japan

2021 Solo exhibition   Weaving My Life & Weaving Our Lives   New York City

                                                 at Loop of the Loom-for NY Textile Month

2021 Group exhibition  LICA@Atlantic Spring 2021 Atlantic Gallery   New York City

2021 Curatorial exhibition  Art teleported in Korea 2021  CICA Museum in Korea

2020  Curatorial exhibition  Fashion & Fiber art 2020  CICA Museum in Korea

2020  LIC-A@ATLANTIC VI   Atlantic Gallery in Chelsea New York City in March

2019  Exhibited " Wagokoro"Group show in Tenri Gallery in New York City 

2018  Exhibited ”Oru” at the Tenri Gallery in Cologne, Germany.

2018  Exhibited ”Amuse” at the Tenri Gallery in Paris.

2017  Solo exhibition "12Years"at the Tenri Gallery inNew York City

2016  Exhibited ”Metamorphosis” at CRS in New York 

2015  The Loop of the Loom group show at the Tenri Gallery in New York City 

2015  Exhibited "Deep and Deep, Gucha Gucha” at The Sheep Palette in Kyoto, Japan

2012  Solo exhibition “Cocoon” in Yushima, Tokyo

2012  Exhibited “Soul Journey“ at excy gallery in New York City

2012  Exhibited “All” at The Sheep Palette in Kyoto, Japan

2011  “Re –Birth“ was Nobu’s first solo exhibition, held at CRS in New York City