Hypothesis: “‘Wilderness’ is a place where ‘demons’ are brought back to life as human beings.”

In the Old Testament, a “wilderness” is said to have acted as a place for severe ordeals and death, while also serving a place of transition, where one creates or encounters something. Maruyama’s interest lies in the latter aspect. In her view, creativity can originate in a marginalized position, which is outside the order of a certain community.
Based on that image, the setting of the “wilderness” in her work is a field in one’s inner mind. It is a field to which people who feel estranged in today’s society can come. To Maruyama, these are people who came to think of themselves as “demons.” Specifically, this “wilderness” is where “demons” come to be purified and to revive their own selves, through being released from the real world for a short while. In that field, the “demons” who have shed off all unnecessary things cheerfully celebrate one another’s revival as human beings. At this very moment, a “demon” in that “wilderness” might be in the process of being reborn as a human being.

The theme of the [ABDUCTION] exhibition was for the participating artists to create works based on their own hypotheses.
The Japanese oni demon is a dauntless, imaginary monster with horns that has a variety of meanings. In this work, she referred to the demon’s state of mind that is derived from a children’s game in which one plays the role of “oni demon” who is dodged by all the other players.