Hajime Sorayama
Born in Ehime, Japan in 1947 and currently based in Tokyo. In 1999, he designed the concept for Sony’s entertainment robot AIBO, and in 2001, he designed the album cover for the international rock band Aerosmith’s Just Push Play (2001). In recent years, Sorayama’s collaboration with Kim Jones for “Dior Men” has been the talk of the town. Sorayama’s recent works include “Unorthodox” (The Jewish Museum, New York, 2015), “Desire” (by Larry Gagosian and Jeffrey Deitch, Moore building, Miami, 2016), “The Universe and Art” (Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, 2016; Art Science Museum, Singapore, 2017), “Cool Japan” (Tropenmuseum, Amsterdam, 2018), “Tokyo Pop Underground” ( (Jeffery Deitch, NY/LA, 2019-2020), “Sorayama x Giger” (UCCA Labo, Beijing 2022-2023), and a major solo exhibition at the new Museum of Sex In the summer of 2023, a large-scale solo exhibition at the new Museum of Sex in Miami, Florida, USA, is also in the works.
http://sorayama.jp/ja/
https://nanzuka.com/ja/artists/hajime_sorayama
Instagram：＠hajimesorayamaofficial

Painter/illustrator Hajime Sorayama is currently showing his new exhibition, Space Traveler, at three venues in Tokyo. Standing in front of his installation of a robot sculpture at NANZUKA UNDERGROUND, the main venue, the artist says, “When you stare at it for too long, you start to get dizzy. It’s like space motion sickness,” with a cheeky smile across his face. 

The installation, which uses up the entire first floor, has six female robot sculptures placed in individual containers with mirrors inside, making the robots appear as though they’re floating. An infinite number of robots can be seen in each mirror, and due to the difference and distortion between the actual sculptures and their reflections, the viewer starts to feel something akin to “space motion sickness,” as described by Sorayama. “You might get sick if you look around while moving. You have to be very careful. It’d be a mess if you threw up inside the gallery, right? (laughs).”  

Sorayama is known across the globe for using what’s come to be known as “sexy robots” as central themes in his work, which could also be described as “robot shunga.” The artist shocks the public whenever he creates something new, including collaborations with domestic and international musicians, artists, and corporations. It seems as though Sorayama’s latest exhibition is full of surprises that speak to the senses. “I feel like that’s the point. I make art to surprise people.” He grins again. Below, Sorayama shares exclusive details about his new exhibition and creative philosophy with us.  

Developing art one step at a time 

—For your installation of human-sized robot sculptures, you used mirrors to show your work in a new way. 

Hajime Sorayama: You don’t know how such effects would turn out unless you test them rather than simulate them. I showed one of the sculptures that use mirrors at Art Basel in Hong Kong (one of Asia’s biggest art fairs) this year, but this is the first time I’m showing several within an exhibition space I worked on in Japan. I develop my artwork step-by-step, thinking, “What would be interesting to do next?” Creating egg-shaped containers, not rectangle ones, would have been ideal, but it was technically and financially implausible. I want both the floor and ceiling to be curved next time. 

—The sculptures—the motif of the exhibition—look like they’re floating. The name, Space Traveler, matches the exhibition too. 

Sorayama: The gallery came up with the name. The only thing I wanted to do was to make the sculptures float. I made the sculptures with a craftsman at a workshop, and they gave it their all when I made unrealistic requests. They said, “Well, let’s make it happen, then!” Some robots are in the air with their knees drawn to their chests, while others are on their tip toes in a pose similar to a swimmer about to jump off a diving board. I asked them to make the robots’ bodies lean forward without the support columns showing, which was hard because the sculptures were heavy and made from aluminum.  

—How did you decide on the robots’ poses?  

Sorayama: The ones hugging their knees resemble the first-ever female robot I drew. The other pose, the moment someone’s about to jump off a diving board, actually comes from an illustration of a robot I drew with the words “freedom” and “liberation” in mind. In the image, the term “hikari” (meaning “light” in Japanese, a nod to Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s last words, “More light!”) and the human rights organization Amnesty International’s candle logo look like they’re floating in the background. I rearrange old works and retouch old paintings quite often. 

—The reflections [of the robots] are interesting too. For instance, in the back, you could see patterns reminiscent of art deco (a decorative style characterized by straight lines and geometrical shapes that represent the advancing industrial civilization in the first half of the 19th century). You previously said your metallic female robots are like goddesses. In this exhibition, I noticed a circular shape behind the robot sculptures. It made me think of something zen-like, where I could meditate on my own Buddhist nature.

Sorayama: You can interpret my work however you want. You can let your thoughts run wild or put your hands together and bow. I always test how my installation would affect someone walking into it every time I have an exhibition. It’d be boring to show something that’s just printed out because what I want to do is to stun people. The best part of my art is surprising people. 

I tried doing something on the second floor of NANZUKA UNDERGROUND. First, when you enter the room, your eyes go to a painting of a motif based on the skeleton of a Futabasaurus. I made it a bit flat, as though it were stretched out. It looks slightly panoramic. The canvas for this is divided into three panels, and I placed the panel with the neck and face at a certain angle utilizing one of the corners of the space. When you approach the painting, it feels like the dinosaur is looking at you. Usually, corners like this are considered useless, and many people place three-dimensional pieces there, but I always felt like those corners were valuable enough to use. I often wonder if paintings could be shown on curved surfaces. 

Bigger artworks are more persuasive and unexpected 

—The exhibition also includes paintings made on large canvases. You’ve recently been enthusiastically making large paintings, but what was the catalyst? 

Sorayama: My answer is simple; bigger pieces are more persuasive and excite people. To mention one catalyst, I saw The Coronation of Napoleon by Jacques-Louis David (the second largest painting at the Louvre), about nine meters wide, at the Louvre in Paris around 30 years ago. David’s signature on the corner was as big as the biggest painting I made. I thought, “I’m going to paint a bigger painting than David’s.” But alas, I couldn’t paint something as big as that in Japan, partially due to the circumstances of housing here. I couldn’t take on the challenge for a long time, but I started renting a spacious studio a little while ago. So now I’m redeeming myself after 30 years.  

—I heard you incorporate a traditional technique used for oil painting called sfumato, where you blend transparent layers on top of the paint. It seems like you enjoy trying out different old techniques.  

Sorayama: In my case, I use acrylic paint, not oil paint. Oil paints smell bad and dry quickly, so they don’t suit my painting style. I don’t, however, copy old painting styles; I mix different techniques. For example, I sometimes use prints as a base. Specifically, I would recreate a hand-drawn illustration in 40 megapixels and print that out onto a giant canvas using 12 colors. I would then add various colors of paint, such as fluorescent colors. Art collectors give me a weird reaction when I tell them I utilize prints, but I use giclee printing, which uses dyes; that way, I can get a very clear shade of blue that I can’t with oil or acrylic paints. It’s close to a radiant color you’d see on a monitor screen—kind of like light. There’s no reason for me not to incorporate such techniques, right?  

—You’re showing a video using CG technology for the first time. 

Sorayama: To be honest, I’m still not at all satisfied with the video. The body in it isn’t shining at all. There were issues with the budget and time constraints. It’ll take 100 years to complete it. The last scene has a motif of the earth with a diamond ring, and I asked them to put a slight time lag so that its reflection would show on the robot. I thought you could do anything with CG, but that’s not true.  

—You can freely draw things that would be financially difficult to make with CG. In other words, you do something CG can’t do through painting. 

Sorayama: With painting, you can do whatever you want if you take the time to work on it manually. Sure, time and money were concerns, but I noticed a difference in how artists and those who work in science and technology think. In some cases, you can’t easily create something visually organic and soft with a computer. People working in animation always talk about the uncanny valley, right? The term refers to a “valley” where something becomes disturbing the more realistic it becomes. It gets creepy once it crosses a boundary. I also think this has something to do with how the brain perceives reality.  

The artist’s role is to express the opposite of the norm

—A lot of foreigners have been coming to your current exhibition. Is there a difference in how people respond to your art in and out of the country? 

Sorayama: There isn’t much of a difference at the moment. I feel like my art has no borders. Even in Japan, the responses between Tokyo and other prefectures aren’t that different.  

—Some of your works deal with sensitive subjects. Do you ever receive complaints?  

Sorayama: Hmm. There’s no point in overthinking it. Whenever I make something, I never think about such things. I don’t really consider whether I’ll exhibit whatever I’m drawing/painting at the time. I only draw what I like, to begin with. I only think about social themes when I have an exhibition like this one. But I don’t have to be worried about complaints because the gallery takes care of them (laughs). It’s not good to demand artists to make socially acceptable works too much. You can say artists are the antithesis of the norm, in a way. After an artist puts their work out, all they have to do in the end is to say, “Oh well, I don’t know.” 

People tend to appreciate erotic illustrations and pornography less than fine art, but they’re the same to me. Like food and sleep, sex is a fundamental human desire you can’t neglect. The robots I drew were initially pornographic and derived from pin-up girls.  

—It’s like an ideological attack, in a way. I believe one of the reasons young people are drawn to your art is not only the art itself but your attitude. 

Sorayama: Takeshi Kitano came out with a new film called Kubi recently. Things during Nobunaga Oda’s time were even worse than today, with all the deceiving and killing that went on. Takeshi-san is brilliant because he didn’t create a clean-cut heroic story like one of those mainstream period dramas. This isn’t limited to artists; take Jacques-Yves Cousteau, a French oceanographer who invented a regulator, a diving apparatus, called the aqua-lung. He lost his son while developing the device, but that didn’t stop him. In my eyes, those who continue doing what they want to do regardless of taboos and criticism are brilliant.  

—I think it’s true to your character to describe such people as brilliant. Regarding your female robots, which all have a metallic shine, you said that you see god in light and that your god is a goddess, that the light is a girl.  

Sorayama: I don’t remember what I said that long ago (laughs). There’s a limit to the fake or artificial light you can imitate. To be blunt, impressionists can’t paint a light that’s more intense than the sun, right? Today, you can make something look like it’s shining through CG technology, and the viewer can also tell when something is supposed to represent light. But the question is, how much can one surprise others that way? I want to create a light that’s almost unbearably bright through drawing. I know I can’t produce a light brighter than the scope of the shades between white and black because it’s a drawing. It might be a losing battle, much like Don Quixote charging toward a windmill, but I want to create a light that would make people surprised and ecstatic. I’m constantly pushing those boundaries. 

Translation Lena Grace Suda 
Photography Hironori Sakunaga

Hajime Sorayama
Space Traveler
April 27 (Thu.) – May 28 (Sun.), 2023
NANZUKA UNDERGROUND
Open: Wednesday – Sunday / 11:00-19:00 *Closed on Mondays and Tuesdays

27th (Thur.), 2023 – TBD
NANZUKA 2G
*Opening hours are same as Shibuya PARCO

April 26 (Wed.) – May 27 (Sat.), 2023
3110NZ by LDH kitchen
Wednesday – Thursday / 11:00-16:00 Friday – Saturday / 11:00-17:00 *Closed on Sundays, Mondays, Tuesdays, and Holidays
https://nanzuka.com/en/exhibitions/hajime-sorayama-space-traveler/press-release

The post “The Best Part of My Art is Surprising People”—Artist Hajime Sorayama’s Evolution and Creative Philosophy   appeared first on TOKION - Cutting edge culture and fashion information.

At his latest solo exhibition at NANZUKA UNDERGROUND in Jingumae, he showed a new series of “box-shaped paintings with mirrors.” A transparent acrylic plate is placed on the front side of the box, and a mirror is placed on the opposite side, so that the paint on the surface of the transparent acrylic plate and the image reflected in the mirror behind it are both visible at the same time. “When you paint a picture, what you paint and what is painted are usually identical. In other words, they are perceived as the same thing. I tried to separate the two and create a state in which they are seen at the same time but separately.” Taniguchi continued, “I was interested in why people find something more in a painting than its constituent elements themselves. That mystery was fascinating to me.” We interviewed Taniguchi at the exhibition venue to learn more about his new works, his creative process, and where his interests lie.

“Separating the material and the image and showing them at the same time”

–Your new series of work shown in this exhibition uses an acrylic plate and a mirror to simultaneously show the image of a girl and the paints applied to the plate. They are box-shaped, and the drips of paint and other details made me think that the painting was done on an acrylic plate after assembled. How were these actually produced?

Makoto Taniguchi (hereafter, Taniguchi): Sometimes I paint the acrylic panels before the box is assembled, sometimes I paint after the box is assembled; in my early work around 2006, the acrylic panels and mirrors were not combined to form a box-like structure. When I paint after constructing the box, I do it while looking back and forth between the reflected image on the mirror and the paint on the surface of the acrylic plate. However, there are no particular rules for how I paint or how I work.

–In your early works, the acrylic plate was covered with a thicker layer of paint, and the visual difference between the painting on the acrylic plate and the painting reflected in the mirror seemed to stand out more clearly. Did this change happen naturally at some point?

Taniguchi: For me personally, I am not conscious that I have changed it that much. One of the things that originally inspired this series of works was the mystery of why people try to find something more than paint in a painting, even though it is just a lump of paint. I have always been interested in the act of separating “paint” and the “something” found in the paint and presenting them simultaneously. Perhaps my style is changing naturally on that basis.

–The box-shaped form is also impressive. I can associate various things with this shape, such as a grave, a cathode-ray tube TV, or a monolith from the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey. Have you been creating box-shaped works since your early days of your career?

Taniguchi: I created the prototype for this work in 2006, but it was not box-shaped at that time. I placed a transparent board on the legs and a mirror on the floor. Later on, I created one with a frame. And long before those two, I had begun to create such works in the process of creating a performance. When I was painting, the more I tried to get closer to what I wanted to paint by layering or shaving paint, or redrawing image itself, the more I felt that I was getting further and further away from what I wanted to paint. So I wondered if I could show this act as a performance. But I did not actually do the performance, it ended up unfinished. But triggered by the idea of “showing the first state and the last state of work at the same time” within the performance, it became what it is today. If what is visible on the surface of the acrylic plate is the “latest state” of the painting, and the bottom layer of what is on the acrylic plate (the bottom layer of the painting material), or what is reflected in the mirror behind it, is the “first state,” then I wanted to show both of them at the same time.

—I think this work stands out within the history of painting in that it is “box-shaped” and “shows the beginning and the end of the painting simultaneously.” How conscious are you of the notion of painting itself? Do you think of your works as “paintings” in the first place?

Taniguchi: I think there have been many different views on painting and what a painting is, and many different people have thought about it. Rather than focusing on the concept of painting, I have been thinking about picture. What I have been thinking about is why people try to find something in a picture, or why the creator tries to put something in it, as I mentioned earlier, rather than whether a painting is good or bad from artistic point of view.

“There are moments when I feel a sense of presence, as if what I have drawn suddenly begins to come alive.”

–Please tell us about the motif. This girl seems to be unfinished work, compared to the characters in the cartoon. I think this imperfection is another point that attracts the viewer’s attention. What does this girl mean to you?

Taniguchi: For example, when I am doodling casually, there are moments when I feel a sense of presence, as if what I have drawn suddenly begins to come alive. It may be closer to “a picture of such a moment” than to a picture in progress or is incomplete. I also believe that humans, in many cases, do not necessarily perceive or remember everything in front of them clearly. It’s like there are clear parts and blurry parts. I myself don’t really think of them as girls. They are more like symbolic forms, with eyes and a human-like shape.

–This exhibition shows your newest body of work. Is there anything you have
tried for the first time, including the method of display?

Taniguchi: For this exhibition, there are two large works in which the depicted
images are approximately the same size as viewers. I placed them away from
the wall, thinking of making the paintings look as if they existed in the middle of
space, or as if they were standing there.

“I am interested in the imagination that changes and the imagination that does not change.”

— This is a different topic from this exhibition, but since COVID pandemic, things like video communication, Vocaloid, and Vtuber have attracted a lot of attention. How do you see the current situation in which images that are separate from matter have come to be accepted in a physical senses?

Taniguchi: I don’t know what these technologies will actually become in the future, but I am interested in how they may or may not change the human imagination. I think that the spread of various technologies has changed the way human imagine in the past. People today, for example, use a different imagination than people did hundreds of years ago, and conversely, there are some form of imagination we no longer have. I am interested in such changing or unchanging imagination.

The title of this exhibition uses ♡. That does not mean that the works are directly about the heart or mind, but rather about something much broader. I wondered what would happen if I used the heart as an entry point at this time of the age, so I titled the exhibition “Where is your ♡?” The word “♡” does not only mean “heart” or “mind,” but also includes many other significations. A sentence, “Where is your ♡?” evokes a variety of meanings.

I believe that the way “heart” exists has changed through the ages, and humans must have lived in times when there was no concept of the heart. I have heard many theories about the shape ♡, like “it is derived from the shape of the heart” etc., but nowadays, for example, it is used as a symbol to represent a cute image or a “like” on a social networking service. on social networking sites. Perhaps people’s hearts are changing little by little, even by repeatedly adding a heart to someone’s post on the Internet, though this may be an exaggeration.

I once saw an old portrait of a man and thought he looked different from the way people look today. I thought that it might have been painted that way, not because of the way it was drawn or the technique, but because they really have that kind of face and expression. Perhaps people’s faces have changed as the state of what we call the mind has changed, or as the shape of our imagination has changed.

Or maybe things like avatars, Vtubers, or image filters could be seen in later years as the faces of our time. That would be interesting to see.

Where is your ♡?
Dates: July 23 ~September 4, 2022
Venue: NANZUKA UNDERGROUND 2F
Address: 3-30-10 Jingumae, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo
Hours: 11:00-19:00
Closed: Mondays and national holidays
Admission: Free
Official website: https://nanzuka.com/ja/exhibitions/makoto-taniguchi-where-is-your-heart/press-release

Makoto Taniguchi
Born in Tokyo in 1982, Taniguchi graduated from Tokyo University of Arts, Intermedia Art Course. He has participated in 美少女の美術史(Art History of Beautiful Girls) (Aomori Museum of Art, Aomori / Shizuoka Prefectural Museum of Art, Shizuoka / Iwami Art Museum, Shimane / National Taipei University of Education Beishi Art Museum, Taipei, 2014-2015, 2019), Takahashi Murakami’s Superflat Collection – From Shōhaku and Rosanjin to Anselm Kiefer- (Yokohama Museum of Art, Kanagawa, 2016), TOKYO POP UNDERGROUND (Jeffrey Deitch, NY / LA, 2019) and other exhibitions in Japan and abroad.

Official website: http://makototaniguchi.com
Twitter: @makototaniguchi
Instagram: @makototaniguchi

Photography Kousuke Matsuki

The post Separating Image and Matter: Artist Makoto Taniguchi Talks About the Meaning behind His “Girl Paintings” appeared first on TOKION - Cutting edge culture and fashion information.

This time, we feature photographer Daido Moriyama. He is a world-renowned master of snapshots who takes photographs while walking on the street with a compact camera in hand. He describes his work as, “Walking, looking, shooting. That’s it”, but the single shot that results from that one step has always surprised the world.

“I can keep stepping forward because of this. It’s just like a lifeline, which is as essential as electricity or gas is” Moriyama says so of his self-published photo journal Record (記録) he launched in 1972. In 1973, the journal ceased publication in the wake of the oil crisis, but was resurrected in 2006 with the publication of its sixth issue. Since then, the magazine has continuously released, and this year he published its 50th issue. To commemorate the publication, AKIO NAGASAWA GALLERY GINZA is holding an exhibition of photo images from all the fifty issues on multiple slide screens. At the venue, all the photographs in Record are projected randomly, transcending the time and place where they were taken.

“These are for sure photographs I have taken, but I feel as if I am encountering them for the first time” In front of these images, Daido Moriyama talked about his  journal Record and “photographs.”

“All of my daily life is reflected in Record“

—Record began as “a minimal medium to hand-deliver what you photographed and immediately printed to people nearby.” What was the motivation behind this? And why did you choose the word “Record” for the title?

Daido Moriyama (Moriyama): To put it simply, I wanted to print out fragments of my true daily life for people to see. That is why I started Record. Therefore, it is a little different from a photo book in which I select and compile images from a collection of photos I have taken. I would print them out as quickly as possible and have people look at them, which is what Record is all about. As for the title, it’s really simple: “A photograph is a ‘record’.” Of course, a photograph is both a “commemoration” and a “memory,” as in “commemorative photograph.” I had always thought that photography simply consisted of these three elements of “record,” “commemoration,” and “memory.” But I felt that “commemoration” and “memory” did not fit well as titles, so I decided on “record,” which is the simplest. So there was no deep reason for it.

–You started the first issue of Record in 1972, and then ceased publication once.

Moriyama: I stopped it in 1973, so the publication ceased shortly after its launch (laughs). Because of the oil crisis in 1973, the cost of printing skyrocketed considerably. I wanted to continue, but it was impossible for me because I couldn’t afford it.

–This year is exactly 50 years since 1972, when the first issue was published. That’s half a century. Looking back on the Record, do you feel that anything has changed significantly during that time?

Moriyama: In a sense, Record is my personal media, so it’s no use for me to look back on things like that. However, it was a big deal that Akio Nagasawa of AKIO NAGASAWA GALLERY asked me to do Record again in 2006. That was how Record was restarted. Until then, Record had been in my memory and on my mind for a long time, and it came back to me in a flash at that moment. From that point on, my daily life has been reflected in the Record. For example, it contains not only my daily life in Tokyo, but also when I go abroad to take photographs, which is a one-time-only daily life for me. I have never changed the way I want people to see fragments of my daily life as they are. Viewer can simply look at them, without thinking about this and that. That is how Record works. But there are always the feeling of commemoration and the form of memory also mixed in it.

–In the afterword to Record, you mention Shomei Tomatsu and Takuma Nakahira. As to the mixture of record, commemoration and memory, do mean that such memories appear as you work on the Record?

Moriyama: I think that “commemoration,” “memory,” and “record” are not clearly separated, but exist in my own time in a way that they are mixed together. Therefore, Record is a way to have people see these concepts of time through the media. I am also being shown it, and I also want to see it.

–It’s interesting that you also think you want to see it. Does that mean that there is something different between when you are shooting and after the photo becomes a Record?

Moriyama: They are all different. The clearest example is this exhibition. Surrounded by the photographic images, I myself looked at them anew and encountered them anew. That is why photographs are what they are. What is photographed is a momentary event, but it circulates in newer times one after another. I am part of that cycle. Then I feel as if I am also being circulated. That is a very interesting part of this exhibition.

— So does it mean that it’s possible to see things taken 50 years ago that feel current, or to see things taken now that feel like things taken in the 1970s?

Moriyama: I have an anthology of essays titled The Past is Always New, the Future is Always Nostalgic（過去はいつも新しく、未来はつねに懐かしい〔2000〕）, and I think it is photography that makes me feel that way. It may sound a bit smug to put it into words, but you should not look at photographs as if they are old because they were taken a long time ago. Whether they were taken in the past or will be taken in the future, they all come together to form a single photography.

–For example, the 33rd issue of “Record” is a book made up entirely of photographs taken on that one day. Issue No. 50 is a book of photographs of only one woman. How did you come up with that idea?

Moriyama: The photos of the woman in the 50th issue were taken after chatting with Nagasawa. I was like, “Now I want to take a picture of a girl,” and I asked him, “Where should we do shooting?” He was like, “Well, let’s do it here,” and we went out to the outside of the gallery and did the shooting in Ginza and Yurakucho. That’s it. Also in terms of Issue No. 33, I just came up with the idea and decided to do that. It wasn’t like I had a theme in mind. I just wanted to photograph the present. In the process of doing so, I ended up with the 50th issue.

“If you don’t walk, you can’t see, shoot, or even think. “

–In past interviews about photographing the present, you have said, “I just walk, see, and photograph.” And you described your daily life as “incredibly simple life” Do you think that ideas just emerge from this sort of daily life?

Moriyama: That hasn’t changed since before Record, but if you don’t walk, you can’t see, shoot, or even think. Other photographers are different, but in my case, I have to walk. As long as I walk, I see. As long as I see, I shoot because I am a photographer. I don’t think there is anything more necessary than that. That is something that somehow has always remained the same. People often say to me, “You take the same pictures all the time, don’t you?” But I think I myself change a little every day, and if I take one step outside, I find a different world from the one I had before. Whether it is Shinjuku or Ikebukuro, the people walking around are different, I am different, and everyone is different. That is the only way. If I don’t take pictures, I don’t know who I am.

–So there are times when even you don’t understand yourself?

Moriyama: Of course. There are also times when I lose my sense of understanding by taking pictures. But even so, if I continue to take pictures, I will begin to see things. After all, once you leave your house, there is the outside world, and the outside world is alive. The city literally is alive. I am a part of them, and I slip away in and take pictures of them.

— It must have been difficult for you to walk outside in the past few years because of the pandemic.

Moriyama: I was shooting inside the house for about two days, but for me, I couldn’t help it if I didn’t go outside. No matter how many stores are closed, that’s what the city looks like today. That is the view of the city under the COVID-19 pandemic. It is true that there are few people on the bus, and the town is almost empty. But that is also reality. As a photographer, I feel a kind of reality in all of this. For Issue No. 50, I took pictures of a woman because that is what I felt like doing, but from Issue No. 51, I decided to go out into the city again. Well, I’ve already started shootings for the next one. That’s how I continue to do the same thing for a long time. I myself am too old to walk as fast as I used to, but as long as I have legs, I take pictures because the city is there. I think that’s good enough.

–What makes you want to take pictures when you go outside?

Moriyama: There is not much of a reason. To put it in a complicated way, it is something like the physiology and constitution of myself as a human being. There is no reason for each photograph, but all of them have my physiology, body, and feelings, and within them are memories, feelings to commemorate, and thoughts to remember. When I am taking a picture, I think all of these things come together. I walk around with my physiology, my body, and my feelings of the day. First, I walk. I see. And I take pictures. That is my daily life, my real daily life.

記録 RECORD
Dates: Open until September 3
Venue: AKIO NAGASAWA GALLERY GINZA
Address: Ginsho Bldg. 6F, 4-9-5 Ginza, Chuo-ku, Tokyo
Hours: 11:00-19:00 (closed 13:00-14:00 on Saturdays)
Holidays: Sunday – Monday and national holidays
Admission: Free
Web site: https://www.akionagasawa.com/jp/exhibition/record/

AKIO NAGASAWA GALLERY AOYAMA will showcase photographic prints mainly from Record Issue No. 50 from June 9. All Record (in stock only) will also be available for purchase.

記録RECORD
Dates: June 9 – August 6
Venue: AKIO NAGASAWA GALLERY AOYAMA
Address: Noir Bldg. 2F, 5-12-3 Minami-Aoyama, Minato-ku, Tokyo
Hours: 11:00-19:00 (closed from 13:00-14:00)
Holidays: Sunday – Wednesday, National Holidays
Admission: Free

Photography RiE Amano
Edit Jun Ashizawa(TOKION)
Translation Shinichiro Sato(TOKION)

The post 時音 Vol.17 “Walking, looking, shooting. That’s it” Photographer Daido Moriyama Talks about the Record and Photography appeared first on TOKION - Cutting edge culture and fashion information.

The beauty of “fluidity” and “colors” she found in her childhood underly in Alive Painting. Nakayama mentions, “After calligraphy class when I was washing up the brushes, I captured the mesmerizing beauty of ink drifting through the water.” She continues, “In calligraphy class, you know how teachers cross out the parts that need to be improved, saying things like, ‘it would look more beautiful if you upstroke here a bit more.’ I got so frustrated whenever they did that. And my patience was wearing thin, but that was when I spotted beauty happening in the sink, where we usually wash dirty things. I found beauty that no one there was noticing, and I realized how your mind and perspective can convert ugliness into beauty.”
Nakayama discovered the art of colors on her excursion one day to sketch plants. “I found a stem that was green mixed with red, and I was sketching it with color pencils. Green and red gradually mixed and turned into an ambiguous color that wasn’t purple or orange—it was a vegetable color. Then subsequently, I felt the raw smell of plants through my nose exuding from the color, and it was so real—That was my significant experience with colors.”

Fluidity and colors—How does the creator view the natural and pleasant beauty that emanates from Alive Painting? We visited her atelier to hear her story.

From the formative college years to the birth of Alive Painting

–So I heard you were always into drawing and also performing. How did they evolve into your current style?

Akiko Nakayama (from hereunder Nakayama): Since I was little, I’ve always felt like I can fluently express my discoveries and thoughts better through illustrations than words. So I drew on a reg. I knew almost nothing about art when I started performing but started a “Karate-art club” with my friends. I only remember vaguely, but I think we were doing Action Painting—painting our bodies with karate-like moves. From this Karate-art club, I’d realized that using my entire body to move the brush and create art and live painting are incredibly fun. I started experimenting with a projector and a camera after I got into an art university. In university, we had a place where various students learning designs in different majors gathered together, exchanged information and inspired one another. There, I got to try out many different gears. During the time, I was wondering if there’s any way I could start something collaborating dance, music, and drawing. Eventually, I formed a trio group with my friends and did live performances outside of school, at exhibitions and friends’ parties. I eventually started doing solo performances and played at jazz live events, which by the way, was a huge turning point in my career.

–What jazz events?

Nakayama: First, there’s sax player Akira Sakata’s event called Heike Monogatari (The Tale of the Heike), and I did live painting there. Art and music share a lot of common languages, like tone and compositions. When improvising, the melodies were infused with colors, and we made the rhythm of the drawing deliberately offbeat or in sync with the rhythm of the music. I found joy in non-verbal communications and doing sessions with musicians.

–Can you tell us about Alive Painting? How do you create the fluidity and the color phenomenons?

Nakayama: I use a turntable for Alive Painting and draw painting on top of it. I create a slope with water on one side, use a dropper or an injector to control the number of drops, create a swirl, warm up the layered paints to create foam…And I microfilm these moments and observe their movements. There’s a manifold of actions happening even in a tiny space, so it would be impossible to follow all the stories happening if I make the space bigger. Each bubble that appears resembles a human, soul, and what not—Each phenomenon is the protagonist. They appear on the 16:9 stage and are out during intermission. It’s important to create a dynamic enabling the audience to keep their eyes on the ephemerality of these phenomena and all the way through until they disappear.

–It seems like you employ not only paints but other coloring mediums. Do you come up with the formulations by yourself?

Nakayama: Yes, I do. For example, the color inside membranes and plumpness of the bubbles vary depending on the shampoos and detergents used. As my painting doesn’t need to be dried, I can try other liquid options not limited to paint, but I don’t use those that are hard to tell what they are. So, for example, I would use Rayu (hot sesame oil) if people can tell, “Oh! It’s Rayu!” Also, I sometimes use vegetable oils, soil, and sand I bring back from my trips to create colors. I can never forget about my show in Bulgaria—I used water I retrieved from the natural spa next to the theatre to mix in the paint. As a result, it turned out magical, like the colors were drifting calmly in ease… I still don’t know if it was from the spa water, the cold winter weather, or because I was feeling relaxed.

What she want to achieve through her creative works

–Were you inspired by any creators when founding Alive Painting?

Nakayama: I think I’ve been inspired by various artists through learning fine arts and art history in university. To me, Okyo [Maruyama] is “the master of new media art.” He incorporates optical techniques for his ink paintings. For example, he employed the unique visual effect of moiré (mesh patterns of silk fabric,) so that depending on the time of the day, as the angle of light changes, the water in the painting looks like it’s flowing, and fishes look like they are slightly drifting. He also implemented a foreign imported lens for drawing. Finally, not to forget mentioning his painting depicting the legend of a carp ascending the waterfall—Carp and Waterfall. He drew the painting with black ink, however, when I saw it, I thought I saw a rainbow. At first, I thought because the art was so profound, I automatically imagined a rainbow in my head, but then I thought maybe Okyo would draw, intending the rainbow to come visible to those who see the actual painting.

–Your ink paintings are mostly monotone. Would you say they’re inspired by Okyo?

Nakayama: Yes. I heard of a phrase, “There are five different shades of black ink.” By using [different shades of] black ink, spaces are born, and colors come and appear in the viewers’ minds. Simply with paper and black ink, it’s possible to draw a trunk of a red pine tree to look red and leaves to look lush green. Plus, there is a wide variety of black ink and paper, and they come in abundant shades, so I’d say they are essentially not monotone. We can draw a painting of a rainbow without using any colors, which I think broadens the potential of artistic expressions. “Alive” in the name is about Kiinseido (works of art brimming with exuberance and elegance); when I’m looking at a painting, I’m looking for its vital force and grace. Vivaciousness and vitality exude from artworks, and time and force can be perceived from brushstrokes,Gratefully, I learn a lot from different paintings.

–So, not only creating unique colors and movements, but you also need to guide viewers to “feel” a particular way.

Nakayama: The audience and I are all in the same place, sharing the same factors like time, humidity, temperature, air pressure, and sound vibration. The water and foams in my artworks are also affected by those factors. I zoom the matters with the camera, which feels like it’s a sensory apparatus that emphasizes the factors and augments our sensory perceptions. It’s a cycle: the artist, the artwork, and the audience all feel the same oscillation that triggers the substances to move, and the audience re-perceives the factor from the visual feedback.

Nowadays, at my solo performances, I use sounds recorded from live shows. Essentially, I was just interested in observing tiny things by magnifying them, but when I participated in Drawing Orchestra last March, the audio crew introduced me to a great microphone. With the mic, the sound of Soda sounds astonishingly clear, and it picks up faint sounds like a pencil drawing on paper and bubbles popping. I thought it might be fun making music out of sounds I make during my performances and of paints flowing, so I play those sounds during my live performances these days.

Chaos during performances and synergy with the collaborators

–When I saw your performance, I’ve noticed you used many different art materials, more than I’d expected. Are there things you always bring to your performances?

Nakayama: There are art materials that are promising and always bring out the best performances. But I don’t do well when I rely too much on these stalwart players. The paints are largely affected by the surrounding air, and chaos is key in performances. So I purposely place the supplies that I often use in a place hard for me to reach and wait for the paints in action to blend. That way, a miraculous moment occurs, like paint A—a color that’s been hard for me to use—and paint B conflict with each other in the beginning but gradually form an epic moment. To create good chaos, I need to make a good pattern that ultimately transcends into chaos.. it’s a repeat of that process.

–I assume accidents are inevitable when collaborating with musicians or other artists. So how do you prepare yourself mentally when collaborating with others?

Nakayama: The colors and round bubbles displayed on the screen may seem abstract, but in a way, the art is merely a mass of particular substances. Some artists interpret abstractly, but some artists conceive a completely different idea. Though, I think the misapprehensions are fun, and it’s the character of this art. So, when I collaborate, I can also enjoy the unsynchronized ideas.

–What are the unsynchronized ideas?

Nakayama: When I did a live show with a musician, that musician said to me, “I want to project a shadow.” It’s impossible to project a shadow with a projector. Our conversation became a bit of a zen dialogue (a cryptic dialogue.) After the meeting, I had eventually decided to draw a shocking pink painting to make the shade of black look darker. The color was my response to the musician’s image. During the session, the two media—the painting and the sound—communicated with their respective technical languages, and sometimes, I would experiment with a color that the collaborator didn’t request. More than a musician can imagine, the paint colors influence the harmony of the entire show, and the sounds also influence the color harmony. So it’s interesting to see all the elements orchestrating the live performance infusing into one and the finished results delivered to the viewers.

–You’ve collaborated with the fashion brand Hatra, provided illustrations to a literary magazine, and it seems like you are expanding the scope of your work. Would you say it’s because you couldn’t do many live shows due to the coronavirus pandemic?

Nakayama: There was livestreaming, but I had fewer opportunities to perform with live audiences because of the pandemic. In such time, it was a refreshing opportunity to provide illustrations for a magazine and collaborate with Hatra. The literary magazine was fun observing the grey colors in printing materials formed with dark and light dots and getting to try out different things with my illustrations. With Hatra, the programmer created iconographies and studied the graphics of my works to determine how the colorful threads can be woven to achieve the ink scapes. Of course, the dewiness and plumpness of the original paintings are inevitably lost in the finished products, but still, it was an amazing opportunity to have explored the new always of seeing my works, and I got to see the final forms of my ever-changing paintings through the hand-weaving process. I grew sad from not being able to perform live, but with the collaborations, I got to see the iconographies transform in every step of the process. I felt like I and my artworks were given a new place to respond and communicate, and this made me think that despite the drastic changes in our lifestyles, I could keep my hope up high.

AKIKO NAKAYAMA
Akiko Nakayama is a painter. She orchestrates the energy of colors and their fluid flows to move various substances and create a painting alive. The profound performative paintings are incessantly spawned from her performances, such as the ever-evolving Alive Painting. Her artworks, showcasing fusions and vivacious transformations of various mediums and colors, evoke an improvised poetic aesthetic. The audience immerses in the lyrical landscape as they project their identities and see it as living organisms and nature. TEDxHaneda, Ars Electronica Fes (Australia), Biennale Nemo (Paris), LAB30 Media Art Festival (Augsburg), and MUTEK Montreal are among the performances she has accomplished in recent years.
http://akiko.co.jp

Photography Kohei Kawatani
Translation Ai Kaneda

The post What is Alive Painting? Artist Akiko Nakayama’s Poetic Emanation of Fluidity and Colors appeared first on TOKION - Cutting edge culture and fashion information.

Gallerists, artists, and collectors are now researching and trying to predict what kind of art will appear in the post-corona generation.

In this seventh installment, we are joined by editor and art producer Shigeo Goto. Through his gallery/publication house”GP + abp”, he has introduced a lot of up-and-coming Japanese photographers to the world and contributed to the rise in  popularity of “Japanese photo” in Europe. He was among the first to thematize essential concepts for surviving contemporary art scene such as “art thinking,” “art strategy,” and “value generation” and has trained and coached young people at the At Kyoto University of the Arts, as well as at the online school A & E developed in cooperation with CAMPFIRE. “I’ve always been interested in people’s talents because the world is driven by all these talents,” says Goto.

As a visionary who has independently considered the current state of the global art scene and has led artists to the future of it, how is he looking at the art scene to come? He speaks to us, citing three keywords.

The Necessity of Infrastructure and Internet Skills for Instant Access to New Collectors and Patrons

――First of all, I think the coronavirus pandemic had a massive impact on the art scene. Simultaneously, it shed light on the problems and contradictions of it as well. How do you see the current situation?

Shigeo Goto (hereinafter referred to as Goto): Firstly, in terms of market aspect of it, it is true that there were many galleries that had to close the real space due to the pandemic. However, overseas mega galleries such as David Zwerner and Hauser & Worth still haven’t lost sales. Why? In fact, for several years, they have been proactive in developing online systems. They have successfully built unique platforms for presenting and selling works online even when the real space is closed. However, many Japanese galleries had not prepared for such innovations.

They had not been able to organize their own business format in response to the fluidization of the art world and the shift of social infrastructure. That is a problem. A keyword for the paradigm of future art scene would be “Net technology.” Obviously, the pandemic accelerated the development of online transactions, SNS communication, and expansion of sales channels developed from before Corona pandemic. Now we are in an era where artists riding the wave of online technology can sell their works directly to collectors. It has confronted the galleries with a need for re-strategization of themselves and has become one of the prerequisites for those who want to achieve a leap in the art scene.

Also, artworks with virtual form of value such as NFT art, AR art, or VR art, have been evolving more and more. The art market has already expanded as a global network and its map has changed. A more amount of capital will be concentrated in regions such as China, Hong Kong, and other Asian countries, which will further lead to the emergence of new collectors and to the formation of a new art world. Now, the auction prices offered in the “Christie’s” in Hong Kong are running up. Due to the coronavirus catastrophe, galleries and art fairs that have traditionally relied on “real” sales are at a loss and vacillating between two different attitudes: Should they evolve their new business format or can they still hope for the recovery of new normal? But in the meantime, new young collectors and patrons will step up their presence as players, and the ecosystem of value will certainly change. Unlike previous generations, new players are open to the new infrastructures and technologies that enable instant access to what they seek.

There is a constant discussion on how to incorporate “art thinking” into business, but that dualism is no longer valid. If both galleries and artists do not aim for a new “value generation” practice, they will be replaced with a new platform.

The art world of the 2020s cannot stand without new “art thinking,” “art strategy,” and “practice.”

――As with galleries, it seems that Japanese artists do not use SNS or digital tools very efficiently.

Goto: I think that if they don’t utilize them proactively, they will be wiped out.

The world leading Japanese artists such as Murakami, Nara, and Hiroshi Sugimoto have already built a global value, but it seems that all of them have been “Galapagosized” and become introverted due to this disaster. However, what I feel when teaching at university is that young artists have a sense of crisis and are excellent. They are starting to acquire collectors and patrons by actively using SNS, videos, and new technologies, in a fairly self-defensive manner. They believe in “the criticism of net technology” rather than the traditional form of “criticism,” just as Kevin Kelly has analyzed in “THE INEVITABLE” and “Technium.” With their amazing skills in self-branding and self-promotion strategies, they can sell out their works, and build up global connections beyond existing mechanisms. They are excellently smart anyway. Since they know the required quality level of artworks for a successful “value generation,” they have no hesitation in outsourcing and can present their works at the level of TED speech. Also, they pay attention to their physical appearances and are skilled at fashionable behavior. It’s an unwelcome phenomenon for those who have created the gallery system and the context of art so far. However, as the word “disruption” indicates, it must be remembered that the things that cause “destructive creation” have always built new eras. We all know that is a specialty more of art than the business world, don’t we? From Dadaism and Taro Okamoto to street artists, the art world has always been updated by the rebels standing on the margin of it.

――Are such young artists not only skilled at using tools and presentations, but also making good works in the context of so-called fine arts?

Goto: They are also becoming more and more skilful at creating contexts. There are excellent students who are tougher than the teachers at the art university coming on (laughs). Even during class, they immediately google unfamiliar terms and artist names, and check overseas writings with DeepL. They understand that they can’t survive in the contemporary art scene without a commitment to global context and critical thinking, so they opt for a fast and deep approach. They fully understand that it is not enough to say “I’m a painter, I like painting and I’m good at it.” A painting can no longer be contemporary art unless it is critical of a notion of painting as a whole. Without “meta-thinking,” even Japanese painting cannot be accepted globally. The tough young artists know this. The rules of critical thinking are being updated at a rapid pace. Therefore, I have been developing and teaching “art thinking” and “strategic thinking” programs at universities because the old academism doesn’t work for these contemporary art issues at all anymore. The old form of education that deals with young artists in a haughty attitude is nothing but harmful. I head up the GOTO Lab, a correspondence graduate school for working people, which no other art university has yet to work on. Not only that, I have also established a private school/an online salon, SUPER SCHOOL online, “A&E (ART & EDIT),” because I place great emphasis on coaching. For example, Jeff Koons and Bruce Nauman are both top players in the global art world, although they have completely different methodologies and production styles. But how have these artists got to the top? What processes did they use to generate value and get to that position? What is at the root of the market and criticism that values art? In fact, not many other art schools offer classes that properly teach such things.

――What kind of specific examples do you use to teach your students about “art thinking” and “strategic thinking”?

Goto: I use examples to show that art projects are actually more advanced in terms of value generation than business. The simplest example is Christo, who passed away last year. As an individual, Christo passed away last year at the age of 80. However, “Christo” is actually the name of a unit of two people. They were a project unit that anticipated the current era and the future. He and his wife, Jeanne-Claude, are artists who have made history with their huge scale projects, such as the wrapped architecture and wrapped seashore. They have passed away, but in September this year, their project to wrap the Arc de Triomphe in Paris was brought to realization after 50 years from its conception, which became a worldwide sensation. What was interesting to me was the fact that the daily progress of the project was publicly disclosed through Instagram videos. It shows that they are trying to present a whole body of work as a new form of value. It is said that Christo’s budget for each of his 20 projects over the past 60 years of their career was the around 200-300 million yen on average, with the Central Park project in New York costing 2.2 billion yen, and the Arc de Triomphe project costing 1.8 billion yen. What is most amazing was that they have continued to do this without any financial support or subsidies from corporations, public institutions, or private patrons. So how did they monetize the project? His wife took the lead and raised all the budget for the project by selling the models and lithographs they made.

In a way, their projects have a more solid strategy and societal aspect than business have. For example, there is a work called “Running Fence,” in which a fabric fence was installed across 40 kilometers of American pastureland and desert. Christo and his team researched the environmental impact of the installation at their own expense and produced a report. Christo and colleagues have been more serious about creating strategic and meaningful business forms and generating value than corporations. I think pioneers like Christo have given a lot of hope to today’s top artists, such as Olafur Eliasson, who have their own huge studios and work on a project basis.

Technology, Sociality, and Life: Three Keywords Needed for the Next Generation

――What kind of people gather at universities and online salons? Are they artists or wannabe curators?

Goto: All kinds of people come. There are people who want to become artists, businesspersons and consultants who want to learn about art thinking, and people who are actually working as curators. There are also people who work at welfare facilities for the handicapped, and people who want to research how art can be used in children’s education as part of TV program production. In particular, there are an increasing number of young people who are interested in the value of art in society and how it can create value. It is a real response to the current situation that shows how they see the future. The business world will need to know about it.

This word “sociality” is a keyword that will become more and more important in the future. There have been some artists who have been dealing with contemporaneous themes of society, such as the harmful effects of globalism. But this Corona pandemic once again highlighted the distortions and contradictions hidden in modern society. More and more artworks that utilize such contradictions as energy or aim to solve problems will be created in the near future.

Many of the artists who are already known worldwide are also developing social activities and influencing the scene outside of art world. The artist I just mentioned, Olafur Eliasson, has created a rechargeable light called “Little Sun” for Ethiopian refugees, and has been involved in projects that drive awareness of the crisis of global warming. Wolfgang Tillmans has also created an alternative space called “Between Bridges” to promote understanding of democracy and LGBTs, and when cultural institutions and clubs around the world were closed down due to the pandemic, he led a project called “2020 Solidarity” through “Between Bridges” as its base. This was a donation-based art project in which artists create posters and distribute them to institutions. The institutions can then sell posters on their own websites for a profit. Thomas Hirschhorn is also working on an “educational” project in a so-called refugee area in France, borrowing artworks from the collection of the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris and having the residents curate them. People who are interested in art are not just looking for beauty in art, but also thinking how to solve social issues through its power. Such people are participating in my correspondence course.

――Each of them has their own vision, and they use art to develop their own methods and ideas. They are innovative as well, aren’t they?

Goto: Artists don’t just present a delusional vision, but a practical one. Some make social proposals within the capitalistic format, and some try to create a rift in the existing system in the so-called anti-capitalistic manner. The scope of the meaning of the term “social” is quite wide, and there are different ways of doing things to embody this notion. Of course, there are some Japanese artists who are working from this perspective, but at the moment, their range of interest is still narrow. That’s something that irritates me (laughs).

Another key word for the new trend of art is “life.” There are of course what is called bio-art, but the ones that interests me the most are the artists who philosophize about life and the theme of life and present it through art. What I am referring to is not an indirect expression, like a drawing that depicts a form of life, but art as a phenomenon of life.

――What exactly is art that takes life as its theme or art that thinks about life?

Goto: For example, Philippe Parreno is a really interesting artist. He rears squid in his house, and he uses large images of the squid’s body surface for his installations. In the past, humans have taken an anthropocentric approach (especially Cartesian reductionism), which has resulted in the destruction of the global environment and the occurrence of violent weather. Parreno relativize life by exploring how octopuses and squids see the world. Such a vision is linked to the concepts of “multi-species” and “companion species” that have been attracting attention in recent years. Dana Haraway has been selected as one of the top three authors by the British magazine ART review is because such a foresight of her is highly acclaimed. It shows that rather than thinking about the form of happiness, community, and sustainability for humans alone, the idea about the symbiotic state of a wide variety of life can create greater value.

Moreover, one of the exhibitions that caught the world’s attention during the Corona disaster in 2021 was Olafur Eliasson’s “Life” exhibition at Foundation Beyeler in Basel, Switzerland. This is a truly symbolic example. Foundation Beyeler is the private museum of Ernesto Beyeler, the art dealer who started Art Basel. In the past, the museum has held highly “distinct” exhibitions such as ones of Gerhard Richter, Jeff Koons, and the collaborative exhibitions between Francis Bacon and Giacometti. In other words, it is the “inner sanctum” of contemporary art. In the exhibition Life, he boldly removed the entire glass façade of the museum designed by Renzo Piano and connected the inside of the museum to the pond in front of it. It is totally open. The theme of this project was also life and symbiosis. This is a strategic and evolutionary project based on the distinctive idea of art that business people would not be able to do. I cannot tell how much of an impact Olafur had on society with this “work.” It can be said that his brand and value as an artist has also been further enhanced.

――In terms of these three keywords “technology,” “social,” and “life,” that you have just mentioned, can you tell us your thoughts on how people involved in the art scene should shift their mindset for the ages to come?

Goto: It’s imperative to acquire “art thinking” and “art strategy,” but what’s important is what kind of value we “realize” and “put into practice” as a result of this process. Most of the time, business people aim for the acquisition of the evidence, such as “developing an aesthetic sense” or “becoming an art collector.” However, since the “value” gained through art is diverse, the “strategy” of how to “connect” it well must be appropriate. Do we want to “become” Steve Jobs as an entrepreneur, or do we want to aspire to an Art de Vivre (art of living) with a collection of pictures? We need to clarify the strategy. The key would be an independent attitude. Even if you don’t have money or come from the middle of nowhere, you can start something with art and create the future with your talent. That belief and attitude are the key. Hans Ulrich Obrist is one of the world’s top curators, but the “starting point of his activities,” as he always says, is his first exhibition, “Kitchen Show,” which was held in his home. World-famous artists such as Peter Fischli & David Weiss were interested in and participated in it. At first, everyone was a nobody. This proves that even if you work locally or don’t have a career, if you can have “art thoughts” and grasp “art strategies,” you can create exceptional value. Unlike in the past, we have powerful communication tools like social networking sites, so we can update what we can do as independent artists. In the age of AI, I’m not worried about singularity in the slightest because art will become more and more important as a place for mind-shifting in which we can train ourselves to improve the speed of our ability, to deepen our capacity and to polish the openness of us.

This fall I am publishing a new book, “Art Senryaku 2/Art no Himitsu wo Tokiakasu (Art Strategy 2: Unraveling the Secrets of Art)”, which is a sequel to the book I published three years ago, “Art Senryaku/Contemporary Art Toranomaki (Art Strategy/ Contemporary Art Text Book).” Unlike the previous book, this one contains 46 interviews with artists that I have been conducting for magazines since 2000, and newly written pieces of texts to contextualize these interviews. What would normally be a “collection of artist interviews” has been re-composed as a book on “art thinking” and “art strategy.” The art world is no longer driven by big isms, theories, and histories. There are people who say that the art world is chaotic, that anything goes, that there are no rules, that you can do whatever you want. But they are totally wrong. “Art thinking” is something real that is going on in the mind of the artists, and it is really innovative. It is also independent, alternative, and timeless. It is fundamental to research great artists who are surviving inside and outside of the art world and are generating value. This is a book that you should definitely pick up.

Lastly, I like “talent”. Whether it is a young photographer or a master like Kishin Shinoyama, I have made it my mission to amplify the talent of the artists in society. It doesn’t matter if it is an opportunity for client work or not. It is fundamental to be independent. That’s why, I’ve been doing my own publishing activities to bring talent to the world from a young age. Since the days when there was no such thing as a book label or any other fashionable term (laughs). I launched G/P gallery, which introduced the likes of Taisuke Koyama, Mayumi Hosokura, Daisuke Yokota, and Kenta Kobayashi to the world, as the commercial gallery division of an editorial production company called artbeat publishers. In 2019, I teamed up with Fuji Xerox to publish a series of photo books called NEOTOKYOZINE, and in a little over a year, I’ve produced about 30 artists. In a way, the Corona disaster gave us a chance to focus on online sales. And from this winter to the next spring, I’m also starting a “new art magazine” in collaboration with the fashion brand “Mihara Yasuhiro”.

DX is drastically changing the form of artistic imagination, the production system, the presentation format, and even the way business is done. Those who cannot make the shift will be dumped into the dustbin, even in the art world. NFT art, a hot topic these days, is an inevitable phenomena. We must not be conservative. We must move forward without fear. The revolutionary Mao Zedong once said, “Learn how to swim while swimming.” That attitude is exactly what we need now. I would like to continue to work on developing the concepts of “art thinking”, “art strategy” and “practice”.

Shigeo Goto
Shigeo Goto is an editor, creative director, art producer, and professor at Kyoto University of Arts who was born in Osaka, Japan. Under the motto of “unique editing,” he has produced many art books and photo collections for Ryuichi Sakamoto, Haruomi Hosono, Kishin Shinoyama, Mika Ninagawa, and Kohei Nawa. He has also curated more than 150 exhibitions through his platform, G/P+abp. His most recent production work was the direction of Kohei Nawa’s huge installation “Metamorphosis Garden” at GINZA SIX. He also runs the GOTO Lab at Kyoto University of the Arts and the SUPER SCHOOL online “A&E (ART & EDIT)” . His most recent book is “Choshashinron: Shinoyama Kishin: Shashinryoku no Himitsu (Super Photography Theory: Secrets of Photographic Power)” (Shogakukan), and his new book “Art Senryaku 2/ Art no Himitu wo Tokiakasu (Art Strategy 2: Unraveling the Secrets of Art” (Mitsumura Suiko Shoin) will be published at the end of September 2021.

Photography Nina Nakajima
Edit Jun Ashizawa(TOKION)
Translation Shinichiro Sato(TOKION)

The post Editor/Art Producer Shigeo Goto Lists Three Keywords for Surviving the Next Generation of Art Scenes appeared first on TOKION - Cutting edge culture and fashion information.

This motif finds its roots in aerosol writing, a subculture in which Oyama has been interested since his high school days. Focusing on QTS, he has been expanding his art through paintings, three-dimensional figures, sounds and installations, analyzing the history and trends of aerosol writing, as well as the physical sensations and thoughts related to his act of drawing. In 2011, he collaborated with Comme des Garcons to decorate the collection with his artwork.

Redrawing the line connecting street art and contemporary art

-I heard that your interest in aerosol writing started in high school. Were you actually writing on the streets at the time?

Oyama: I did a little when I was in high school, but I can count the times on one hand. I was not a street writer. If anything, I would write on a piece of paper and show it to others. However, at the time, there was a strong tendency in the community of street culture to think that those who weren’t writing in the streets were not real writers but fake and unconvincing, and there was a time when I was struggling with my artistic identity because of that. I was feeling that I failed to be a real writer. Though, it is true that aerosol writing influenced my drawing. That fact is a reality, not a made up. So, with that as a starting point, I decided to digest this influence and reinvent my own artistic idiom and share it with the world. In this way, I concieved the motif “Quick Turn Structure” and conceptualized it as my iconic expression. Currently, I’m reinterpreting street art to my extent, with a particular focus on visual language, and presenting them in the field of contemporary art. By clarifying the distance between myself and the street culture, I’m clarifying where I stand and what I want to convey.

-You’re also doing a study on street art; specifically, what are you researching?

Oyama: Street art means a lot of things and includes different type of artists and works. Banksy is street art, but not aerosol writer anymore. In my case, I’m interested in a particular type of street art called aerosol writing, especially the one which developed in New York around the 70s and 80s. However, I’m not specialized in that field as a researcher, but rather as an artist; I’m absorbing as much as I can of it.

-Talking about that era, what interests you the most?

Oyama: Aerosol writing has its roots in the early 70s in New York; it blossomed in the 80s and, since the mid-80’s and 90s, it has evolved in different places and ways interntionally. New York in the 70s and 80s was an energetic place filled with the important seed of street culture. For example, just as Jimi Hendrix developed and expanded the potential of the electric guitar, aerosol paint pushed the potential of street art to the next level in that era. It’s exceptionally fascinating how everyone started painting on subway cars; it’s like an artistic medium that goes across town. Many of the writers of the time were very young, so their range of daily activity was limited, and that’s why, through the subway system, they devised a method to show their existence in the form of art to the public who lived further away from them. The aerosol writing of the time in New York was impressive in terms of design too. New York, where abstract expressionism was born in the late 40s, became an important location for the art scene, forming an intimate relationship with the concept of abstraction, which is why some of the aerosol writers in the 70s and 80s also had tendency towards abstraction. Banksy and other artists in the Europe conveyed their message of social criticism and satire through concrete illustrations; New York artists such as Futura 2000 and Rammellzee, for example, focused on abstraction through letter forms and created their own original universe. There was a lot of potential for expression in aerosol writing in that era, from their visual aspect to the way they “hacked” the city like urban guerrilla.

The reason for using the term “writing” instead of “graffiti”

-In recent years, you’ve been using the term “aerosol writing” instead of the relatively generalized “graffiti.”

Oyama: One of the reasons was that I personally met and talked to one of the pioneers of aerosol writing, the New York artist PHASE2, who passed away in 2019. He didn’t appear in the media in his later years, but he always hated the word “graffiti” and was persistent in calling this culture “writing.” In Japanese, graffiti becomes “rakugaki,” meaning scribble, which has a negative nuance, hinting at illegal, troublesome behavior.  Not only PHASE2 but also other pioneer writers of the early 70’s would call their expression “writing.” However, around the same time, the adults and the media started defining it as troublesome behavior, hence the term “graffiti.” So, in a sense, the word “graffiti” came from the prejudice and bias of the people outside this culture.

-Nowadays, some writers actively use the term graffiti.

Oyama: Some of the writers of the next generation say that what they’re doing is graffiti, an attack on society; vandalism with a rebellious spirit. Every culture and expression changes slowly over time. There was indeed a time when the essence of street art was illegal and rebellious, and such aspects are still there, but it’s fine for them to change; not all artists are like that. I myself wasn’t writing on the streets, and I’m involved in writing from a different angle, and if vandalism were at the sole core of this culture, I think it wouldn’t have spread all over the world this much. It is actually more complicated, or became complicated and diverse over time and we can not summerize it in one essential element. I personally see one of the most important appeals of this culture is straightforward self-expression through writing one’s name, which even a child can do. Sensibility or curisosity of a child is common among different languaghe spheres, social classes or ethnic groups worldwide, and I think that’s why writing spread universally. Reinterpreting this culture from the perspective of “writing” rather than vandalism is where I stand, and the message I want to convey with my art. In that sense, I am using the term aerosol writing.

-In your art, one can see important elements of modern and contemporary painting such as “abstraction,” “movement” and “repetition.” There are also techniques of modern painting that sort of “erase” the picture, instead of “drawing” it. Are you consciously introducing elements of the so-called fine art in your production?

Oyama: I wouldn’t say consciously, but rather spontaneously; I look at contemporary and modern art paintings, and I have many favorite painters. For example, Christopher Wool. First, he draws a line on a smooth surface support base with aerosol paint and wipes it, leaving a trace which becomes the painting. I also associate these kinds of works to Futura 2000’s. Robert Rauschenberg’s Erased de Kooning is also deeply fascinating. Rauschenberg was a post-war American artist. He erased a drawing he got from Willem de Kooning with an eraser and presented it as his own work. On the streets, you can often see writings that were later erased with a roller, leaving slightly different color on the concrete wall; I see a sort of connection between that and Erased de Kooning.

Solo exhibition Noctilucent Cloud, showing new concepts such as spacing compositions inspired by stone gardens and ink espressions

-I heard that you went and researched different zen temples in Kamakura and Kyoto for this exhibition. Could you tell us about any creative input you got from that experience?

Oyama: The idea to visit temples came from Mr. Hitoshi Nakano, the curator of this exhibition. I’ve been based in New York for eight years now, and I’ve been somewhat thinking about my Japanese heritage and how to naturally reflect that in my practice: that’s why I went with him. Zen and Buddhism are profound cultures, though; it’s impossible to understand them with just one visit, so I just went there to find some inspiration.

-Specifically, what kind of inspiration did you get?

Oyama: I was particularly inspired by rock gardens. When placing stones in a rock garden, you’re practicing how to form space with the minimum amount of elements. If you identify the appropriate points, the space will fill with the relationship with each placed stone. In particular, the stone garden at Ryoan-ji Temple was the most unassertive, hard to describe: it was just there, and I was captivated by that. That’s not specifically reflected in this exhibition, but in Exhibition Room 5,  the largest one with 700 square meters, I aimed to create an appropriate spatial relationship by limiting the number of exhibited pieces to six, which is very few considering the size of the space.

-In that exhibition room, there is ink drooping on the floor where the pieces are hung, to make the viewers feel some kind of presence is there. Is that kind of spatial practice like some sort of extension of writing?

Oyama: It’s about showing the paintings as an installation, which includes how to arrange and display the pieces. Even in my studio, it’s common for aerosol paint to droop on the floor. This installation is an extension of that feeling. In the Exhibition Room 5, some pieces made with aerosol paint and ink are showcased. Sho (Japanese calligraphy) is also another kind of writing. At first glance, Sho and New York writing may seem completely different expression, but they have something in common: they both pursue artistic formation letter shapes. This production is also based on that.

-The new three-dimensional piece Cross Section / Noctilucent Cloud is also on display. Can you interpret it for us?

Oyama: For this piece, I used a heat-insulating material called “styrofoam,” which is used in construction for buildings. I piled up about 200 plank-shape styrofoams whose thickness is 1.5 centimeters so it becomes about 3 meters high and cut off one side of it with a heat cutter. The physical sensation of cutting it is similar to that dynamic feeling of swinging my arm to draw a long line when I do live painting. It’s the feeling of giving a shape by roughly cutting through a large accumulation of styrofoam. You could say that this piece acts as a wide brush stroke with three-dimensionality in the space of the room. That and, styrofoam is originally light blue. I colored it black, but I slightly left the original color in some parts. If you look closely at the details of this black lump, you can see hints of light blue leaking from it. It reflects the image of this exhibition, the Noctilucent Cloud, glowing pale in the night sky.

-Although it looks very solid, it somehow looks light too.

Oyama: Styrofoam is a voluminous yet light material. There’s a piece by Jeff Koons which is a balloon-like sculpture made with solid metal. One of the interesting aspects of contemporary art is emphasizing the gap between how a piece looks and what’s it made of. The lightness of our postmodern society, sense of temporaly construction, and the way street art as signs floats and circulates in the urban space; those are some of the inspirations why I used styrofoam.

The act of redrawing lines creates new expressions and cultures

-The collaboration with composer and pianist Toshi Ichiyanagi during is one of the highlights of the exhibition, in my opinion.

Oyama: Mr. Toshi Ichiyanagi is the artistic director of the Kanagawa Arts Foundation, which hosts the exhibition. A project to commemorate the 20th anniversary of its inauguration is underway. Mr. Ichiyanagi was once active in New York, just like me. The keys of a piano, the music scores; they’re black and white, like my artworks. On the day of the event, a young pianist will perform Mr. Ichiyanagi’s compositions in the exhibition space.

-2020 was a year full of events that shook our social values, such as the coronavirus pandemic and the Black Lives Matter movement. Last year, you published your exchange of letters with Mr. Tetsuo Kogawa entitled The Semantics of Aerosol: Thoughts and Arts after the Pandemic – A Dialogue with Tetsuo Kogawa; could you tell us about the post-pandemic mindset we should all adopt?

Oyama: The pandemic is still ongoing, and it’s hard to say anything conclusive about it, however, we could at least say that our post-corona values and perspectives are different from how they were in pre-corona. For example, the word hikikomori used to have a negative connotation, but after the virus, remote work is recommended, and we could say that hikikomori-like lifestyles are at the forefront of our era. What we’re doing is the same, but its value changes depending on how you draw the line between positive / negative, encouraged / discouraged. It is about changing context and I think this may also happen in different scenes, for instsnce, art / non art. I’ve started doing my practice since there was a deep gap between street culture and contemporary art. In recent years, street culture’s way of expression has stepped over the boundary line of fine art, and that’s why it’s now acclaimed in that field too, but the line drawn between them hasn’t essentially changed. I think what’s happening is some type of street art or artists are just picked up by and integrated into comtemporary art keeping the border between the two realms. Instead, I think that by redrawing the fixed lines, by changing and shifting the boundary line, the values and perspectives of the world can change dramatically, and new expressions and cultures can be born.

Enrico Isamu Oyama
Born in Tokyo, 1983. In 2007, he graduated from the Faculty of Environment and Information Studies of Keio University and completed his Master of Fine Arts at the Department of Intermedia Art, Graduate School of Fine Arts at Tokyo University of the Arts in 2009. Starting from his unique motif “Quick Turn Structure,” that reinterprets the visuals of aerosol writing, Oyama is developing his art into different expressions such as painting, three-dimensional objects, spaces and media. He recently published The Semantics of Aerosol: Thoughts and Arts after the Pandemic – A Dialogue with Tetsuo Kogawa (Seidosha).
Website: http://www.enricoisamuoyama.net
Twitter： @enrico_i_oyama
Instagram： @enricoisamuoyama

Enrico Isamu Oyama – Noctilucent Cloud
Dates: December 14, 2020 – January 23, 2021
Venue: Kanagawa Prefectural Gallery
Address: 3-1 Yamashita-chō, Naka-ku, Yokohama-shi, Kanagawa-ken
Time: 11:00-18:00 (admission is permitted until 30 minutes before closing)
Closed day: January 7, 2021
Entrance fee: 800 Yen for adults, 500 Yen for students and people over 65; Free for high school students and younger
A collaboration event with composer and pianist Toshi Ichiyanagi will be held on Sunday, January 17th.
URL：https://yakouun.net/

Photography Ryosuke Kikuchi

Translation Leandro Di Rosa

The post The Potential of Writing / Drawing Lines – Enrico Isamu Oyama’s New Praxis appeared first on TOKION - Cutting edge culture and fashion information.

“Archive” and “things that I like” – What kind of music scenes and movements have become the blood and flesh of Hiroshi Fujiwara? From his “addiction” to punk rock in middle school, to his encounter with hip hop in New York and his career in house music as a DJ; while unraveling his new album “Slumber 2,” we explore the past and present of musician Hiroshi Fujiwara.

The “smooth and natural process” from punk rock to hip hop

–Punk and hip hop; I think that these two genres are important to you, but first of all, I would like to ask you the reason why you were obsessed with them.

Hiroshi: I got into punk around when I was in my second year of middle school. Children at that age like rebellious, bad boy-ish stuff, right? I think punk hit that spot just right. I sympathized with punk’s defiant spirit and style, which is different from bōsōzoku (Japanese motorcycle gangs).  In 1982, I went to London because of that, but the next year I moved to New York. Malcolm McLaren, who I met in London, told me that New York’s hip hop was getting interesting and suggested that I go there. At the time, musically speaking, punk was over, and hip hop was starting to catch everyone’s interest. Malcolm too, but also “The Clash” were trying to make something with hip-hop, and shortly after, “Sex Pistols” Johnny Rotten also collaborated with Afrika Bambaataa. It was a time when the people who were doing punk were also trying to adopt hip hop in their music.

–Punk rock and hip hop were strong influences for you at the time; what do they mean for you now?

Hiroshi: Punk has a lot of spirituality. It’s the kind of attitude that makes you do something a little strange or make fun of something popular. Hip hop is based on sampling, which is like reconstructing from what you already have, and that’s fascinating. This had an impact not only on music but on fashion as well.

–In Japan, you were active as a DJ since around 1983, and then formed the hip hop group “Tiny Panx” with Kan Takagi, which led to the advent of Japanese hip hop. In 1994, you released your first solo album “Nothing Much Better To Do,” declaring that “this is the beginning.” What did you mean by that?

Hiroshi: I simply meant that I wanted to hit the reset button once and release my solo album; nothing more. Before then, there was no release under my real name. However, as always, I wanted to make something different from other people, something weird for that album. At the time, step-recorded house music and ground beat (Japanese name for British soul music) were mainstream. It was full of people making music with brilliant diva-type singers, so in “Nothing Much Better To Do,” I went for types of music and singers that were different from the mainstream, like Terry Hall of “The Specials.”

–Why did you start pursuing music that is different from hip hop? Hiroshi: One of the big reasons is because I started liking house (which originates from disco) and house-like music more than hip hop. It was around the time when Public Enemy became popular and hip hop, in general, was advocating for “Black Power” and getting to be more and more serious. I’m Japanese, and I’m not really good at expressing my nationality, so I guess that’s what distanced me from hip hop.

To be honest, I make music and am influenced by what I like at the moment

–In recent years, you have also started to sing for yourself, which makes you more of a singer-songwriter. Before that, I think your style used to be more about expressing different world views by featuring various artists. What was your turning point?

Hiroshi: I just found the right timing inside of myself to stop with featuring projects. After all, with featuring, 70% of what you make goes to the featured person, which is also a good thing, but I’ve come to think that if I want to put out what’s in my head, I should sing myself.

–Your previous album “slumbers,” has been released by “NF Records,” which is owned by Sakanaction’s Ichirō Yamaguchi. How did that happen?

Hiroshi: It all started when a friend introduced me to Yamaguchi-Kun, and we got along. After that, I got to be in charge of remixing Sakanaction’s “Rookie.” Then, at some point, while talking to Yamaguchi-Kun about my album, I asked him if we could release it under his label, and he said: “let’s definitely do that.” And that’s how it got released.

–There is an age gap between you and Yamaguchi-San, but do you think you have a similar sense of music?

Hiroshi: I get interested in a lot of things, but I feel like Yamaguchi-Kun’s whole way of life is completely “music-centric,” and that may be different from me. However, he is a very charming person; there is something that draws people to him.

–Shunsuke Watanabe was working as a sound producer for your previous work too. You know him since you formed the band “AOEQ” with Yōichi Kuramochi of Magokoro Brothers, right?

Hiroshi: He has been on tour with me as a keyboard player since the days of AOEQ. We started working together because I fell in love with his sound. It’s very easy to produce music with him; he’s great at translating whatever I ask for advice from him into sound.

–It seems like getting along and falling in love are very important things for you.

Hiroshi: I would say so.

–In this new album, I’ve noticed many demo-sounding parts, like guitars that sound like they were recorded at home. It sounds like you were really enjoying the production process; were you trying to experiment with something new?

Hiroshi: For the most, I’m doing everything the way I’ve always done so far, but it may be my first time to sing disco-like songs by myself.

–In your song “SPRINGLIKE,” you’re whistling the main melody. I thought that was fresh.

Hiroshi: That’s a sample of a whistling instrument, so I’m playing it with a keyboard. I’m partially taking inspiration from Frankie Knuckles’ “Whistle Song,” which everyone in our generation knows about.

–You made music videos for every original song in the album, except for the covers. I was surprised to see you dance in the music video for “TERRITORY.”

Hiroshi: It’s been a while since the last time I made music videos. Yamaguchi-Kun suggested me to make them, but I thought it was too hard and expensive (laughs). I tried dancing for that song because it’s disco-like. There used to be a TV show called “Soul Train” that aired in the United States from 1971 to 2006, which I was also watching on Youtube, and the way people dance in that show is not too technical, it just looks like they’re having a good time dancing. I wanted to express that kind of feeling, so I decided to dance in the video.

–While producing a track, are you consciously thinking about generational differences in music?

Hiroshi: Not that much. The important thing is if I like what I’m doing or not. To be honest, I make music and am influenced by whatever I like at the moment. It doesn’t matter if it’s from the past or the present, it’s good once it goes through my filter. That is true not only for music but for fashion too.

–In recent years, city pop has been through a revival, and I was wondering how you’re digesting it. As a listener, do you have any thoughts about this music phenomenon?

Hiroshi: Actually, I haven’t listened to city pop in great detail. I very much like the new wave of city pop that is being made around Thailand, Indonesia, and all over Asia in recent years, though.

–You don’t even listen to Eiichi Ohtaki’s stuff from back in the days?

Hiroshi: I haven’t listened to that at all. Before going to middle school and listening to punk rock voluntarily, I was forced to listen to Yuming or whatever my older sister would put on since we shared the same room. From middle school on, I was all about Western music, and I couldn’t listen to Japanese music at all. However, thinking back, I think I was partially influenced by the 70s folk music my sister used to listen to. Listening to that stuff again now, I realize there are many good songs. Makoto Kubota, for example, I like him a lot.

–I guess folk music is part of your roots as a singer and composer.

Hiroshi: I think so. I think Sakanaction’s music also has folk-like roots. When Yamaguchi-Kun shows me his new songs, sometimes the chord progression is very folk. They’re really great at arranging though, so they make it sound almost like house music. I feel like they do some really cool stuff that I can’t do myself. It’s kind of what I felt when I heard Towa Tei making music in Japanese for the first time.

–How is your process of writing lyrics? The lyrics for “PASTORAL ANARCHY” in the new album feel quite ideological.

Hiroshi: When writing lyrics, I write down interesting words and sentences regularly, and once a theme is decided, I put them all together like a puzzle or a collage. For “PASTORAL ANARCHY” though, I wanted to make it into a song since way back. In an area of southern Switzerland known as Ascona, there is a place called Monte Verità where thinkers and anarchists who were disgusted by the German industrial revolution moved in to form a commune around the year 1890. I have been there many times, so I wrote the lyrics about its sceneries and utopian ideals. I wasn’t very aware of it, but it kind of matches the mood of the world these days. I don’t have a precise idea of utopia, but I am interested in the state of mind of people with such ideas.

–Regarding your new album, Yamaguchi-San of Sakanaction said that he could feel your loneliness even more than the previous album. The word “loneliness” really left an impression on me; does it ring a bell for you?

Hiroshi: It doesn’t (laughs). However, this album was undoubtedly influenced by what Yamaguchi-Kun’s NF Records and Sakanaction are doing. If it wouldn’t be the case, I would have never made such cold, house music sounding tracks. When I listened to NF Records’s music and all the DJs who work around Yamaguchi-Kun, I thought it’d be nice to include such elements.

It’s a culture scene that doesn’t evolve, but I still love music

–What genres of music are you personally focusing on, recently?

Hiroshi: I listen to both old and current music at random so I can’t say which one is better, but I also listen to a lot of new indie songs. The Asian city pop music I was mentioning earlier is good, and I also really like Beadoobee’s voice.

–In an earlier interview, you said that “fashion and culture haven’t evolved much since 1990.  I often hear about 90s revivals, but the 90s might just not be over in the first place.” Do you see this “non-evolving culture scene” as boring?

Hiroshi: I don’t think it’s boring. However, it’d be nice to see or hear something that I have never seen or heard before.

–Why did music stop evolving after the 90s?

Hiroshi: In terms of music, samplers had a great influence on the music from the late 80s to the 90s. However, I don’t think that there has been anything revolutionary that changed the scene after that. Even vaporwave and chill-out music are actually influenced by the music that was created in the 80s and 90s. The same goes for fashion; these cultures have entered their evolutionary period of maturity. For example, from now on, we could enter a new period of evolution for different fields such as medical care, and that may entwine with music, creating something interesting that has never existed before. Like, if you listen to this beat, you will live longer, or this melody will cure your cold, or something like that (laughs). Whether new or old, I love music and fashion.

slumbers 2
This album is Hiroshi Fujiwara’s first original album in three years. In addition to a simple edition consisting of ten songs and bonus tracks, a deluxe and limited edition (only 2500 sets) was released at the same time. The deluxe edition, in addition to the standard edition’s CD, comprises different versions of all songs in the album, such as dub remixes, a special CD containing the music from the short movie “HARMONY” directed by Rinko Kawauchi, and a T-shirt. The streaming version also contains another version of “WALKING MEN” with lyrics written by YUKI.
www.jvcmusic.co.jp/fujiwarahiroshi/slumbers2/

Hiroshi Fujiwara
Musician, music producer, and founder of fragment design. He started being active as a club DJ in the 80s and formed “Tiny Panx” with Kan Takagi in 1985. From the 90s, he has expanded his activities to music production, composition and arrangement. Since 2011, he has also been performing in the band “AOEQ” formed with Magoro Brothers’ Yōichi Kuramochi. As a solo artist, he released the albums “manners” in October 2013, “slumbers” in November 2017 and “Slumber 2” on this year’s October 7.

Photography Kentaro Oshio

Translation Leandro Di Rosa

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