I received an order to create a statue of the 80th Priest Chikai Kitagawa(1864-1946) of the Toshodaiji temple at a ceremony.

There were few records remaining about him, so the process was based on one black and white picture and a hanging scroll of him, with the story told by Toshodaiji temple (about his life, his character, his work, etc.) First, the model of the statue was created, and the creation process went on while consulting with Toshodaiji temple.

The statue holds a long-handled censer in his front, which depicts him being given an ordination on the platform in the ceremony.

His clothing is unique to Toshodaiji temple, which is the head temple of the Ritsu-shu denomination. I interviewed the staff of the Toshodaiji temple intently in order to depict it accurately, and which included details of the priest’s outer robe, how to put it on and take it off, how to use a long-handled censer. They even let me borrow the robe and put it on the side during the production in the workshop, so that I could study the details of the unique robe whenever needed.

I tried to make the statue express his life, in which he sacrificed his own properties to protect the temple’s treasure and the doctrine in the age of the anti-Buddhism movement.