Under a blazing sky, I had an errand and walked from Palaceside Building. Near Kanda Police Station (Kanda Nishiki-cho 2-chome), at the entrance of the building diagonally across, cool-looking dolphins were swimming in a pod. When I approached with a camera, a building guard quickly hid behind a pillar. They seem used to visitors to street sculptures.
The nameplate reads "Springen — Ryohei Miyata." Nearly forty dolphins leap with power, each with a different expression and beautiful form. The streamlined dolphins and splashing waves are dynamic. Springen is German for "leap," "soar," and "fly high through the sky," and every dolphin in the pod glitters on its own, reflecting the midsummer sun even more brightly. I stopped and watched for a while. That silver shine seemed to refresh the air right there — cool in the sweltering city. (Though it was still hot, of course.)
The artist Miyata is a metal craftsman and the current president of Tokyo University of the Arts. His "Springen" dolphin series is a signature work; he has kept creating since becoming president, and in one lecture spoke along the lines of: "My starting point was the bond I felt with dolphins that gathered around the ship when I left Sado High School for the Tokyo Geidai entrance exam — a feeling that they were blessing my departure." This year's Geidai action plan also expresses a wish for "an age filled with 'heart-flutter' in the world."
Rather than heart-flutter or emotion, I could only feel a brief coolness from the Springen dolphins — a walk where I found a lovely sculpture and reflected a little on myself.