I usually make buttai while holding it in my hands.

I try to create movement through the forms of the materials and the ways in which they connect. There are no clear rules, though, and much time is spent in an uncertain process of handling and manipulating the materials. In my hands, forms come together and separate, becoming inside and outside.

Eventually, things begin to stray from my intentions, and when my mind has been completely reset, the necessary elements finally start to come together, and the form begins to roll. At the same time, a different sense of unease emerges.

I conveniently imagine buttai as if it existed in a state of weightlessness. In reality, however, I am the one holding it and rolling it in my hands. If that is the case, perhaps the physical sensations of my own body—the pressure I apply when touching it, the adjustments I make to balance its weight—are already part of buttaiitself.

For this exhibition, I made something like a device that attaches buttai to the end of a rod protruding from the wall. This creates a space behind the object. It is a recreation, in a way, of the space that exists when I hold buttai in my hands and look at it. It also came close to what I had felt to be the ideal way for the work to be complete while held in my hands.

Thanks to this, the shape of buttai wraps around completely, and I had time to appreciate its sense of mass, which made me feel excited.　 　 Miho Dohi 2026

HAGIWARA PROJECTS is pleased to present a solo exhibition by Miho Dohi, opening on Saturday, October 31, 2026. This marks her first solo exhibition at the gallery in four years. Dohi has exhibited at galleries and museums in Paris, Los Angeles, New York, and elsewhere, and her work has received international recognition.

Dohi creates sculptures by combining a wide range of materials, including wood, copper, brass, aluminum, fabric, thread, paper, plaster, and acrylic paint. Rather than working with found objects, she develops forms from the materials themselves. Through a variety of gestures—bending, tying, sewing, hammering, twisting, and painting—she carefully shapes each work, attending closely to the smallest details. Through this accumulation of processes, the materials gain a greater sense of physical density and presence, gradually taking on forms of their own.

Many of Dohi’s works are titled buttai, a Japanese word combining but (物, “thing”) and tai (体, “body”). The term aptly reflects the nature of her sculptures. Beyond idiosyncratic abstract forms, her works possess an organic presence that suggests a sense of life. At times, they may evoke man-made objects, plants, or animals, yet they do not represent any specific thing. They resist being contained within familiar names or images. While suggesting associations with recognizable forms, each work emerges as an independent presence in its own.

Dohi’s sculptures invite viewers to imagine and associate them with a variety of things, while remaining open to multiple interpretations rather than being confined to any fixed meaning.

Miho Dohi completed the research program in sculpture at Tokyo Zokei University Graduate School in 2002. Her major solo exhibitions include Nonaka-Hill (Los Angeles, 2024), Crèvecœur (Paris, 2023), HAGIWARA PROJECTS (Tokyo, 2022), Gordon Robichaux (New York, 2021), The Renaissance Society at the University of Chicago (online, Chicago, 2020), Showcase Gallery: Miho Dohi, Yokohama Civic Art Gallery Azamino (Yokohama, 2020), Lulu (Mexico City, 2017), and HAGIWARA PROJECTS (Tokyo, 2016), among others.

Recent group exhibitions include Statics of an Egg, David Zwirner (New York, 2026); A Nail to Hang the Day On, Kunstverein in Hamburg (Hamburg, Germany, 2026); The Gatherers, MoMA PS1 (New York, 2025); The 8th Yokohama Triennale: Wild Grass—Our Lives, Yokohama Museum of Art (Kanagawa, 2024); IL MORSO DELLE TERMITI, Palais de Tokyo (Paris, 2023); and AGAIN-ST: Roots / Tools—The Fictional Materials and Teaching Materials of Sculpture, Musashino Art University Museum & Library (Tokyo, 2022), among others.