Yuta Niwa presents a new installation at Tea House New Balance. He connects the balance of the feast with a single thread.

There’s an abundance of all kinds of things, and all sorts of opinions are flying around. I’m not even sure if there’s a right answer or not.

The installation “Balance of the Banquet” by artist Yuta Niwa offers a perspective that views today’s world as a single banquet. It will be on view at “T-HOUSE New Balance” starting Friday, October 2.

Mr. Niwa is a painter who, drawing on traditional Japanese painting techniques and imagery, has come to represent invisible calamities and irresistible forces as “black entities” such as catfish. After completing his graduate studies at Kyoto University of the Arts in 2019, he studied abroad in Beijing and is currently based in Kyoto.

The key element of this exhibition is a single thread that extends from the canvas into the space. The hanging scroll *Dark Fragrance and Sparse Shadows* features designs representing forces of pull and push—such as *kubibiki* and *Tōhachiken*—while a *nekomata* peeks in through the gap in the sliding doors to observe the scene.

In the adjacent room is *The Equilibrium of the Feast*, depicting monstrous creatures seated in a circle, sharing a drink. From there, the motifs expand to include a trilogy based on anecdotes about sake cups associated with bees, crabs, and dragons, as well as legends surrounding German shoe-shaped beer mugs. Even works that seem unrelated at first glance are secretly connected by a single thread, creating a unified sense of balance throughout the entire exhibition space.

The starting point for this thread is “The Fuji Mandala,” a work created by Mr. Niwa in Indonesia last year. Taking the “Imaginary Line”—the pilgrimage route leading to the sacred Mount Merapi—as its starting point, the work brings into this space the sensation of invisible lines felt in a land where different faiths and times overlap in multiple layers.

A celebration held together by a single thread might collapse if one were to let go just a little. Yet people continue to raise their glasses and linger there. Mr. Niwa depicts a contemporary landscape where such precariousness and festivity coexist. Though it appears to be a glamorous celebration, it is in fact built upon a single thread. Walking through this exhibition space, visitors may find themselves contemplating the concept of “equilibrium” from a slightly different perspective than usual.