FY7 Educational Outreach Program

"Let's Play Shape Chain" Workshop Report

On March 7th (Sat) and 8th (Sun), 2026, the Ota City Magome Art Gallery held its first children's workshop since opening, titled "Let's Play Shape Shiritori." The workshop took place in the first-floor lobby, where artwork is currently on display, and a total of 31 children participated over the two days.

〇 An experience of creating "words" and "forms" together with artists

Our instructor will be Kanako Fuki, an artist based at ARTFACTORY Jonanjima in Ota Ward. Ms. Fuki creates sculptures using soft materials such as fabric, with familiar objects that make up everyday landscapes as her subject matter. After graduating from Chelsea College of Art, University of the Arts London, she has been expanding her field of activity, including winning the Hiroshi Sugito Award at the "Mimoka Eye" competition for young artists at the Marugame Genichiro Inokuma Museum of Contemporary Art.

In this workshop, Ms. Fuki focused on "shiritori," a game familiar to children. This program transforms the well-known word game into an experience of "connecting words with shapes" through clay modeling.

Communication through clay

Participants are divided into groups of 3-4 people, and each person takes a lump of clay and plays a word game. As the first participant begins to shape the clay, they try to find the "word" that the participant is trying to express from the gradually emerging shape.

"I get it!" "What's the hint?" voices rang out, and the children, who were meeting for the first time, naturally communicated with each other as they derived words from shapes. Some shapes immediately revealed the answer, while others revealed unexpected words, and even for the same word, each child created a different shape. Laughter was constant during the interaction through clay modeling, and the venue was full of energy from beginning to end.

From "making" to "seeing"

The enjoyment of the workshop doesn't stop at the creation process. After it's over, participants can admire how the "word chain" games played at other tables have resulted in different word sequences and shapes. The children looked at the creations, using their clay sculptures as clues to imagine the invisible "word chain stories" behind them.

As an educational outreach program to foster creativity

Through this workshop, the participating children were able to experience the joy and challenges of "communicating words through form," just like an artist.

Magome Art Gallery will continue to focus on developing educational outreach programs that nurture the creativity of children and young people who will shape the future. By offering diverse and high-quality experiences that are difficult to obtain in schools, such as inviting artists as instructors, we aim to deepen participants' understanding of creativity and cultivate rich sensitivity, observation skills, and initiative.

The clay creations made by the children in the workshop are on display at the "Shape Shiritori Workshop Exhibition." The instructor, Fuki's work, "Drawn Rice Cakes, Charcoal-Grilled Corn" (2023), is also on display. Please take this opportunity to visit the Magome Art Gallery. We hope that visitors to the "Shape Shiritori Workshop Exhibition" will enjoy the artwork while imagining the "shiritori" (word chain) that the children created here.

"Let's Play Shape Chain" Exhibition [Ended]

• Venue:Ota City Magome Art Gallery
• Period: Currently being held - Sunday, May 10, 2020 9:00-16:30 (last entry at 16:00)
• Contents: Workshop results and artwork by Kanako Fuki (instructor)