Usagi Kannon

Usagi Kannon stands at a height of 3.40 metres. It has a human face and rabbit ears, reflecting the meaning of the Japanese word ‘usagi’ (rabbit). In Japanese culture, the rabbit symbolises good fortune, agility and kindness, and ‘Kannon’ the bodhisattva of compassion and mercy.

The work was first created in 2011 in response to the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan. With a crying face in mourning, the work is dedicated to the people and living beings who died and suffered losses in the tragedy. It embodies the precarious relationship between creation and destruction, and humans and the environment.

Like much of Ikemura’s artwork, there is an otherworldliness to Usagi Kannon, a translucence between reality and imagination. It embodies recurrent themes of transition, human/nature connectivity, and femininity. A seemingly fragile and delicate form, it is robust at the same time. Usagi Kannon is imbued with a child-like purity that echoes with gentle, untethered nostalgia, expressing the power of naivety and innocence. The work’s ethereal nature and sense of ‘nursery rhyme’ is underlain with both a deep embedded sadness and counterbalancing sense of hope. Extending its narrative to shelter and rebirth, the work invites visitors to explore its shrine-like bell-shaped skirt.

Ikemura’s work spans over four decades. Her first solo exhibition took place at the Bonner Kunstverein in Bonn, Germany in 1983. Since then, Ikemura has exhibited regularly across the globe with exhibitions in South Korea, the Netherlands, Mexico, Shangai, Paris, Tokyo, New York and Los Angeles in 2026, reflecting the resonance of her work on the international stage. Her first UK show, Usagi in Wonderland was held at the Sainsbury Centre in 2021 in partnership with the Sainsbury Institute for the Study of Japanese Arts and Cultures.