Kyoko Gardiner

Kyoko Gardiner (born 25 January 1975, in Tokyo, Japan) is a Japanese poet, artist and theorist. Gardiner started writing poetry and making drawings at a young age, and started publishing works as a student at Tokyo University. Her first appearance in the European art scene as a "kawaii" Japanese artist was through the "Hitch-Snog" travels she made in the early ninetieth with her then-partner Henrik Nyberg, in the Southern region of Sweden, which also had a purpose of raising awareness for Multiple Sclerosis, a condition from which Nyberg suffered. Gardiner became widely known with a public poetry project called "Toilet Thoughts" she started in 1999. "Toilet Thoughts" was made in several Japanese and European cities, and the version made in Amsterdam won People's Awards in 2000, while the original version made in Tokyo was published as an artist book in 2002.

Gardiner lives and works in Scotland, and is one of the leading young Japanese voices writing in English. Her textual works in English include a book of poetries and drawings "Lacuna Diaries", a narrative poem "Songs Over My Sunken Garden [http://www.laurahird.com/showcase/kyokogardiner.html] ", a book of critical essays "And Kitty Shut Up [http://www.blackcatpub.com/gardinerk] " amongst others. Her book of poetry and drawings is forthcoming in 2007 from MATER press in Holland.