SF State students have volunteered to help recreate a life-size model of a World War II Japanese Kaiten submarine with acclaimed artist Katsushige Nakahashi for his project, “The Depth of Memory.”

“It is about the object and how the object can be used as a conduit for discussion,” said SF State assistant professor of cinema and project curator Aaron Kerner. “It’s one more way an individual’s story gets told.”

The Kaiten project uses a unique sculpting method in which the artist assembles a toy model of the object and then takes small square-inch photos of the entire toy model. The pictures are then blown up in size and a team of volunteers—many of them SF State students—tapes them together, thus creating the life sized finished project.

Nakahashi is a widely-heralded artist from Japan who has had recent praise for his use of the picture-sculpting method. His last project, curated at the University of Hawaii, was similar to the Kaiten but instead of a submarine he and a large group of students and volunteers constructed a life-size Zero airplane, which was used by Japanese pilot fighters in World War II.

The process is a meticulous one. Since the photos that Nakahashi has been taking are on such a micro scale, if a truck were to drive by while one was being taken, the photo would turn out blurry. Also, volunteers have to line up the correct pictures and find the grain in the wood, and all the little blemishes need to be continuous and matching.

“The work is tedious, pasting photos after photos. But it adds to that dimension of rebuilding history,” said Miyo Inoue, 27, a cinema studies major who is not only the volunteer coordinator, but will be acting as Nakahashi’s translator for his time in San Francisco.

Volunteer work has already begun, but volunteers are still being accepted for the project.

“I feel very lucky to be working with an artist whose work I like,” said Charlie Corriea, 27, a volunteer for the project. “I have to work through finals, but I think it’s worth it.”

Once the Kaiten has been fully completed it will be on display at Camerawork, a San Francisco gallery dedicated to contemporary photography, from Jan. 3 to Mar. 22 and after its stay it will be burned. Though an odd practice, the burning of the submarine is a significant aspect of the piece.

“There are a number of interpretations to the burning. It’s related to the Japanese cremation ceremony, the release of the spirit and a ritual purification,” Kerner said.

The location of the burning is still under negotiations and many places have been in discussion including SF State, though nothing has been confirmed.