Something to Protect
「守るべきもの」Installed at the head of a shrine's stone stairway — a woven iron egg with a single bird standing watch.
▶ Watch the filmThe Sculptor
Thirty years at the forge, before the first gallery wall.
Ikeuchi trained as a welder in his family's ironworks on the island of Shikoku, twice placing in Kochi Prefecture's welding competitions before he ever called himself a sculptor. In his late forties he turned that trade toward fine art — and since 2009 his work has been collected and awarded across Japan's most serious sculpture exhibitions.
Every piece shown here is still hand-forged in his own workshop in Kochi, using the iron techniques he has practiced since youth. Nothing is outsourced, and nothing is cast from a mould twice.
2009–Exhibiting nationally
6+Awards, Kochi & Shinshoten
2023First shown abroad, APOC
Concept to Reality
Before a piece is forged, it is dreamed in full.
Every commission begins as a cinematic previsualization — the sculpture placed in imagined light, on imagined ground. What follows is not a render. It is standing outside, in weather, today.
Keep Asking
「問う」Set at the tideline, reworked by every incoming wave — a weathered mask raised on iron wire.
▶ Watch the film
Plant
「植物」Grown into a bamboo garden rather than placed against it — iron stems among the living ones.
▶ Watch the filmThe Collection
Six works. Two ways to own one.
Three pieces already exist and can be replicated for your site. Three are bespoke commissions, previsualized here and ready to be forged to your scale.
Realized
Something to Protect
「守るべきもの」A woven iron egg the height of a person, guarded by a single perched bird.
Realized
Keep Asking
「問う」A weathered mask on wire limbs, built to stand where the tide can reach it.
Realized
Plant
「植物」Iron stems and seed-pods, grown to stand among real bamboo and moss.
Bespoke
Fire
「炎」A folded flame of hammered steel, rising through a double-height space.
Bespoke
White Egg
「白卵」A cracked, weathered egg in pale iron, opened onto a warm interior.
Bespoke
Leaf Vessel
「無題」A wire-legged vessel cradling a hammered leaf, shown adrift on salt flats at dawn.
Works in Iron
Shown in galleries, outdoors, and at the museum gate.
Photographs of finished works as they were exhibited and installed. Select any image to view it full size.
Flower & Stone
A wide rusted-iron bloom holding a single stone, carried on one wandering stem — with a pierced iron butterfly settling at its edge.
Rebar Tree
Hundreds of lengths of rebar twisted into a single trunk, opening into a crown above and roots below — wrapped in a band of orange steel.
Museum Monument
Coloured steel blades rising from a black steel core beside the museum's stone marker, reading clearly against the surrounding forest.
Functional Iron
Sculpture you can hang a coat on, sit on, or store things in.
The same hand-forged iron, made to be used every day. Each piece is built to order and can be sized and coloured for your space.
Tree Hanger
A natural log trunk sprouting coloured steel leaves that double as hooks. At home in a nursery entrance or a design-office reception.
Leaf Bench
A long, gently curving bench of cedar slats on many slender iron legs — a creature resting in the garden, with an iron head to match.
Garden Store
A slim cedar-clad store on a steel frame, with a forged iron flower in the window and a red lever handle.
Images marked “Placement image” show how a piece could look in a setting; they are not records of a delivered installation.
Placements
Built for the spaces that speak first.
01
Residence & Lobby
The first object a resident's eyes meet. An iron form at the entrance reads as permanence before anyone reads the brochure.
02
Members' Club & Lounge
A single object in a room built for conversation — placed so that guests are meant to ask what it is.
03
Hospitality & Hotel
An anchor for a lobby, courtyard, or bath-house approach — weatherproof enough for the entrance, refined enough for the interior.
04
Private Garden & Estate
Grown alongside planting rather than set against it, so the iron ages the way the garden does.
Process
From consultation to installation.
Consultation
We review the site — light, sightlines, scale, and what the space is meant to say.
Previsualization
The piece is placed in a cinematic render of its future setting, so scale and mood can be approved before forging begins.
Forging
Hand-built in Ikeuchi's own workshop in Kochi, using welding techniques practiced since his youth.
Installation & Care
Delivered, installed, and weather-tested, with a maintenance plan for outdoor and coastal placements.
Recognition
A record judged by Japan's own juries.
Kochi Prefectural Art Exhibition — multiple awards, 2011–2020
Shinshoten National Exhibition — Osaka Governor's Award, 2018
Shinshoten — Honorable Mention & Holbein Industry Award, 2014
APOC — Asia-Pacific Orchid Conference, 2023
Contact
Begin with a conversation about your site.
Send the location, the space, and what you have in mind. We reply with a previsualization concept before any commitment is required.
- Studio
- IL Bussan Co., Ltd. (有限会社アイエル物産)
Iron sculptor Ikeuchi, Kochi, Japan - Address
- 1073-2 Doi, Noichi-cho, Konan City, Kochi, Japan
- ilbussan@coral.ocn.ne.jp
- Telephone / Fax
- +81 887-54-0711 / +81 887-54-0712
- Full Portfolio
- iwatakuniyasu.wixsite.com/ikeuchi