In 721 AD, two Kannon statues were carved out of one sacred tree in Hatsuse (present day Nara, Japan).
One was enshrined at the Hasedera temple in Nara, the other was cast into the ocean on a prayer that it would reappear to save people where it jetsamed.
The Kannon statue drifted (flotsam) in the water for fifteen years, coming ashore in Kamakura.
In 736 AD, the Hasedera temple was established to enshrine the Kannon statue.

According to the legend, oysters attached themselves to the Kannon while it was lost at sea and helped guide the statue to its landing place.

The Kakigara-inari (oyster shell shrine) collage is embellished by a photography session shot in 1992 for the book- Black Nudes (with me as the subject) as an alternative story, combining metaphors of the Sable Venus and the search for indigenous pathways that is captivated in my work.

The collages are a tribute to medium format film photography made in Japan (summer 2025) and portrait session of me made in Harlem in 1992 preciberated in Othering the ship (Original) - [exhibited in THE ROSE at CPW, Kingston May -August 2025]