sashiko (collector’s edition). Box designed and handmade by Candor Arts to hold a hardcover copy of emi’s book and art objects made by artists Laub, David Bell, Liz Ahn and iris yirei hu (clockwise from left). Edition of 10. The production of the collector’s edition is supported by Hitomi Mochidome, the mother of emi kuriyama.
sashiko is a collection of writing by emi kuriyama. sashiko consists of the late writer’s unfinished novella, a compilation of absurd, dark, and magical vignettes loosely based on her lived reality. Also included is emi’s Cal Arts Creative Writing MFA thesis proposal, addressed to Douglas Kearney, explaining the intentions with her novella. Throughout sashiko, movement principles such as swimming, running, and ghosting help readers understand the connection and conundrum of exile, fugitivity, and belonging. emi’s tender and peculiar voice is felt in personal emails addressed to artists Jennifer Moon, Laub, and Christine Wertheim, each of whom guided her towards cosmological expansion and love, and in whom she found hope. In October 2019, Chicago-based press Candor Arts designed and published sashiko.
sashiko is organized by emi’s friend and collaborator, artist iris yirei hu, who wrote the foreword to the book.
sashiko is in support of the emi kuriyama spirit award and is available for purchase through Candor Arts. There are three editions: paperback, hardcover, and the collector’s edition.
excerpt from sashiko
Chapter 0
the only thing that separates the meat of my consciousness from a body in a morgue are some weak electric impulses started and sustained by some unknowable primordial inertia--move through the world, hold memory in your mind, propagate yourself, speak your personal data, carry it with you until that pulse stops.
Reader, I know we just met, but I need to ask some favors of you—I don’t expect you to comply, but I trust. I trust that you will. I trust you, because, right now, all I can do is trust you.
This paper that you’re looking at—you and I both know it’s a bunch of cheap chewed up bleached pulp from god-knows-where, pressed and dried and covered in a bit of toner, carrying whatever sense it can on top of its fibers. meaning? maybe.
At any given moment, you could—
rub your eyes over these symbols.
rattle these words in your throat.
smash this sheet into a ball.
tear it to pieces.
set it on fire.
watch it burn.
or you could hold these thoughts in your mind, knowing that, right now, you’re holding all the power I’ve ever had between your fingers. My point is, this thing is a thing, but it’s also a message. And this message, I wrote all the nonsense of my life into it, so— here—I am trusting you to help me slam some sense out of this thing.
—emi kuriyama, 2016
Images © Candor Arts
Excerpt from sashiko © emi kuriyama and Candor Arts