Keiji Okamoto (President and Representative Director) Traditional craftsman
Born in 1972 as the eldest son of Tadao. After graduating from an art college in Tokyo, he joined the family business with his partner Ema (now the managing director).
While studying fine arts at a university in Tokyo, I realized that I wanted to go into crafts, not art.
Weaving by hand looks monotonous at a glance, but you have to adapt your technique as you weave each weft, and it isn’t monotonous or onerous at all to me. But I think it’s amazing that my father and uncle have been doing the same work for more than half a century.
I had been familiar with Kinran from a young age and always thought of it as showy and unusual, but then I read about it in the book In Praise of Shadows by Junichiro Tanizaki and learned about the way the gold of Kinran that glows under the candles in dimly lit temple halls and the vivid colors of the textiles are all designed to represent nirvana, and the depth they take on when they’re lit up in the dark, and then I understood. That was when I fully saw the beauty of Kinran for the first time. Kinran’s roots lie in the sumptuous textiles woven for some important figures when textiles first crossed over from continental Asia—it was the first style of Nishijin brocade. People associate Nishijin with obi for kimono, but Nishijin Okamoto is hand-weaving textiles with real gold, passing on the original traditions. And that’s why I see it as my mission not to let Japan’s precious culture end here.
A major issue is skill loss. Nishijin is a unique environment comprising many specialist processes. There are fewer and fewer craftsmen with the high level of skill that is needed, and even the materials are hard to come by these days. We don’t even know how much longer the materials for our Kinran textiles will be made. We are in a crisis, and even the collective work of the company cannot avert that. But if demand increases, we may see people bringing new methods, or new techniques may emerge. So I want to get the word out about the tremendous quality of Nishijin brocade and the crisis we are facing. We are the last generation who can do this. Time is almost up and we have to do this now.
People have to see Kinran in order to understand what makes it so beautiful. I want to create venues for that and do all that I can to make Kinran known so that we can create new markets and demand.
(Interviewed on November 13, 2023 / Text by Sakiyo Morimoto)
