Ishi no Gou
Ishi no Gou
From stone picking to photographs, drawings, stories, and strange games.
I have launched Ishi no Gou, a website bringing together the photographs, writing, books, exhibitions, work, stories, and strange games you have no particular reason to play—all born from my activities as Ishinohito: picking up stones by the sea, looking at them, and arranging them.
→ Ishi no Gou | A Record of Ishinohito’s Activities
I thought I was just picking up stones, but somewhere along the way, the things I do began to multiply. I’m tired. Sometimes I no longer understand what I’m doing. I was supposed to be picking up stones, but while asking myself, over and over, what stone picking actually is, I began spending more time in front of a computer. I’m not getting enough sleep either. I want to go to the sea.
Ishigami-sama.
I decided to lay things out for once. Not the stones, but the things that have come from them.
Looking for stones. Observing them. Arranging them.
Let me begin again.
What I pick up are ordinary little stones lying on beaches and elsewhere. I’m not looking for gemstones or rare minerals. Shapes, colours, patterns, something I can’t quite put into words. I pick up stones that, in my own way, I find good.
Wet or dry. Morning or evening. The angle I look from, or the mood I’m in that day. Even the same stone looks different. Sometimes an unfamiliar landscape comes to mind. Sometimes I remember the sea where I found it.
Arrange them, and something else begins to appear. A stone that was quiet on its own starts talking to the stone beside it. Or so it seems. Of course, that is only what I choose to imagine.
Stone Arrangements, Twelve Stones, Imaginary Shore, A Universe by the Window. Looking at stones, arranging them, and photographing them. Little by little, works have emerged from that repetition.
The name “Ishi no Gou”
Gou. Work, livelihood. And something you cannot help doing again and again.
Every act.
To be honest, I cannot confidently say that I am a good person, a hard worker, or someone who is always thinking about how to be useful to the world. I really don’t think I am. No good.
I do want to be that way, if I can.
Picking up stones is almost like prayer. Arranging them is like a ritual. Concentrating on photographs, drawings, or putting something into words is like copying sutras. There is this strange illusion that stone picking—an utterly worthless act—might somehow be of use. If someone says I am simply escaping into Ishitopia, a utopia of stones, I have no answer.
Back to the subject.
Picking up stones gives rise to photographs and words. They become books and exhibitions, and lead to work involving other people. What I experience there then returns to the way I look at stones.
I want Ishi no Gou to include that movement back and forth.
I don’t sell the stones themselves. Probably. But I do sometimes give someone photographs or other forms of expression that have come from looking at stones. Time spent picking up stones, and time spent working within society—in the broadest sense. Both are part of my life. (If only I could just pick up stones… Stop that.)
I have given it a rather grand name, but for now, it is a place to lay out these strange stone-related undertakings.
I do want to put this on record: every single day, I think, what on earth am I doing?
Into stone stories and strange games
Why strange games?
Apart from Ishinohito, there is another persona within me called Toumo. This person existed long before Ishinohito. Toumo is always making things. Drawing pictures, creating stories, and making a little sound with the help of a computer. (That last part goes back quite a long way.)
Drawings about stones, and drawings with nothing to do with stones.
Stones I have picked up in dreams: Dream Stones.
A story of stones: KORO.
And after meeting Ishigami-sama, I began making strange games.
SOUNDSTONE. Toumo’s Room. And Ishi no Sora, the stone universe connecting these works—a collection of strange games.
In other words, I might as well admit it: I have created a space on the web overflowing with adolescent fantasy. Sorry.
Stones picked up by the sea, and stones inside a screen. They may seem far apart, but within me, they are connected.
I imagine something from the stone in front of me. Unfamiliar landscapes, stones that do not exist. I begin wanting to see them in a form other than photography. To make a world that can be more than read: a world you can touch, make sounds in, and walk through.
That is how stories and strange games have come from stones.
The strange games are co-creations by Ishinohito, Toumo, and Ishigami-sama.
Games. Such a lovely word.
I was absorbed in them throughout elementary and junior high school.
Why do I insist on calling mine strange games? Because I revere the wonderful “games” I have experienced, while what I make is more like a doodle. And because these are strange games with no purpose, no sense of achievement, nothing of the kind. I wonder whether I should even use the word “game.” But I want to.
Real stones are all different. So are the places where we encounter them, and our state of mind at the time. In my creative work, too, I think about chance encounters and experiences that can emerge only in that moment. I’m not doing the same thing in every work, but I think something of how I feel when picking up stones remains somewhere within them.
Adding records to Ishi no Gou
I will gradually bring together photographs and records of my activities, works, and jobs on Ishi no Gou. I put things up quite literally as they were, and after uploading them, found several things that should not have been there. I hurriedly removed them.
Still, I want to record everything I can, including the process.
Not only what I made, but what I was thinking. How the activities connect. What has changed over time, and what has not. I want to keep adding writing and reflections on those things.
If I neatly arrange only the finished works, it all looks rather respectable. It isn’t really that tidy. There are detours, unfinished things, and things I keep doing without quite understanding them. I hope to record those parts too.
The site is now online, at least for the time being. It will keep growing.
I plan to gradually introduce Ishi no Gou here on note, on Ishinohito’s website, ishinohito.com, and on toumo.net. I will share Ishi no Sora—the collection of strange games—and KORO through Toumo’s social media.
https://www.instagram.com/toumo1111
It is difficult to explain everything at once. Actually, I don’t quite understand what is what myself. Calmly. Quietly. One at a time, as though placing stones.
石の人
→石の人による、写真作品。
石スタンプ →いしのこえ
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今回の石の人のおすすめ（2026 10/4）
・KODAK CHARMERA（384おすすめ）
・Cointreau （水出しコーヒーに入れてみた。それだけ。）
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石の人の本・写真・記事
・海辺の石（石の人）
・ユリイカ 2024年9月号 特集「石」（表紙と口絵／石の人）
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石の本 その一
・素敵な石ころの見つけ方
・日本の石ころ標本箱
・地球の石ころ標本箱
・石ころ採集ウォーキングガイド
・いい感じの石ころを拾いに
・石はきれい、石は不思議
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石の本 その二
・石の辞典
・石が書く
・すべてのひとに石がひつよう
・石と人間の歴史
・小品盆栽「遊びの道具」
・美の壺 水石
・美の壺 枯山水
・BRUTUS 珍奇鉱物
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石の漫画・絵本
・宝石の国
・宝石の国
・無能の人
・はまべにはいしがいっぱい
・君たちはどう生きるか
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石と海
石標本（Instagram）
石の日々（X）
石の光と海の音（TikTok）
石の光と海の音（YouTube）
石の物（SUZURI）
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時と星
Toumo
toumo.net
Instagram
online store
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いしひろいたろう
いしひろいたろうのはなし（Instagram）
いしひろいたろうのすべて
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