Those Beneath the Grass is a video installation that explores the entangled histories and relationships between humans and plants, centering on the quiet, repetitive labor of grass cutting. In the depopulated village of Ohara in Fukui Prefecture, only one elderly resident remains. The landscape, once shaped by human habitation, is now steadily being reclaimed by thriving vegetation—yet he continues to mow the grass each day.
As the camera turns to the ground beneath our feet, what first appears to be a uniform field of green gradually reveals a quiet diversity of plant life, each species carrying stories left untold. By tracing the origins of plants such as star sedum, white clover, and Amur adonis, the work uncovers narratives of global trade, rural–urban imbalance, and the reciprocal ties between people and plants.
The paths he mows become “contact zones”: spaces where human and plant life intersect and influence one another. By dissolving the binary between nature and humanity, the work brings overlooked perspectives and relationships into view. And in attending closely to the grass, it gradually reveals how these interspecies entanglements reach into broader social structures.