Ota has spent a long time researching Yaeyama ikat weaving (the Yaeyama islands are part of Okinawa, the southernmost prefecture of Japan) and her main interest is in investigating the relationship between ikat design and the natural and cultural environment.

This installation interprets a particular kind of 'space' which Ota experienced on Taketomi Island in Yaeyama, the main site of her research into ikat. Dotted around the island are places called utaki or ‘sacred groves’. These utaki, which are devoid of decoration and appear somewhat empty and uninteresting when first encountered, in fact play a powerful and central role in the spiritual life of the local people. Ota’s installation was inspired by the emptiness or subtlety seen in the utaki, which reflects an ancient and fundamental aesthetic.

The delicate expression of whiteness in Ota’s sea-bleached coral pieces refers specifically to the notion of emptiness in the utaki and the pathways leading to them, covered in white coral-sand. The patterns and forms imprinted on the coral shapes represent the slow growth of coral as well as the slow process of ikat formation.