YCAM Portal

Daito Manabe + Motoi Ishibashi new installation "particles"

2011-02-12T12:00:51Z

The continuously burgeoning work of Daito Manabe and Motoi Ishibashi in a showcase of unique ideas and excellent skills inspired by media art

Daito Manabe and Motoi Ishibashi, two creators that have been utilizing media technology in their various endeavors traversing a wide area between art, design, advertising and music, unveil their newest work in the particles exhibition at the Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM].
Part of a special program of the Japan Media Arts Festival installed with the aim to offer opportunities to appreciate outstanding works of media art, the exhibition is co-hosted by YCAM and the Agency for Cultural Affairs. Next to producing and presenting the newest work of Daito Manabe and Motoi Ishibashi, prizewinners at the Japan Media Arts Festival, YCAM will also be showing video footage of award-winning works at the 13 th (2009) and 14 th (2010) Japan Media Arts Festival. In addition, a concurrently held exhibition introduces two recent acclaimed works by the artists that have been attracting attention with their combination of unique ideas and excellent programming skills.
Experience the fascination of media art and new forms of technology-based expression in this first major showcase of the artists' continuously burgeoning work exploring the potentials of media art through repeated research, studies and experimentation.

*The exhibition is open through March 31st as a special program of the Japan Media Arts Festival, after which it will continue until May 5th, then hosted by the Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion.

]]> Daito Manabe + Motoi Ishibashi "SONIC Floor" (Kitakyushu Innovation Gallery & Studio, 2007)

New territories opened up through hybrid creative activity

Daito Manabe and Motoi Ishibashi are continuously active as artists, designers and engineers operating across a broad range of fields. While involved as programmers and engineers in various commissioned works created in-residence at YCAM, they have been working on numerous large-scale projects embracing business solutions and information services. Armed with unique ideas and excellent skills, they keep charting new territories and possibilities in media expression through the development of original devices, interface design and programming-based system planning in the realm of industrial development and the production of commercial spaces. As creators covering a wide range of media, they have been part of numerous cross-national collaborative projects, while operating a recently established creative space for research and experimentation. Together they are actively engaging in the formation of a community that functions as a hub for experimental media technology-based artistic work, and an aggregation of human resources and technologies.
Next to unveiling their brand new work as one major attraction of "media art", this exhibition includes a screening of video footage introducing the duo's previous experimental projects and other endeavors, with the aim to indicate possible future directions in creative work based on interaction and the human body.

Workshop (Setagaya Public Theatre, 2009)

WORKS[Special program of the Japan Media Arts Festival]
Daito Manabe + Motoi Ishibashi "particles"
□Related video screenings
"Daito Manabe + Motoi Ishibashi Digest 2004-2011"
"Japan Media Arts Festival Digest" *Through March 31, 2011

Concurrent Event：
YCAM exhibition series for the future artist "scopic measure"
#11 Daito Manabe "electric stimulus to face"
#12 Daito Manabe + Motoi Ishibashi "fade out"

Daito Manabe + Motoi Ishibashi "particles"
newwork, 2010｜Installation

Daito Manabe + Motoi Ishibashi "particles" Lighting points operation screen.

An illumination installation of seemingly floating lights that create a fantastic afterimage, this work centers around an organically spiral-shaped rail construction on which a number of balls with built-in LEDs are rolling while blinking in different time intervals, resulting in spatial drawings of light particles in all kinds of shapes. The illumination's three-dimensional design, achieved through a fusion of the rail construct's characteristic features and communication control technology, takes on various appearances depending on the viewer's position. Look forward to an exciting new work that combines generally entertaining ideas and sophisticated information technology in everything from LED devices and other hardware to programming.

Organized by: Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
Co-sponsor: Agency for Cultural Affairs
In association with: Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Production support: rhizomatiks, DGN
Technical support: YCAM InterLab
Produced by: Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]
*The exhibition is open through March 31st as a special program of the Japan Media Arts Festival, after which it will continue until May 5th, then hosted by the Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion.

Noritoshi Hirakawa new installation"Beyond the sunbeam through trees"

2011-01-04T15:00:00Z

A new artistic hybrid of installation and performance - internationally renowned artists from different genres present the fruits of their collaboration

The Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM] is hosting an exhibition of contemporary artist Noritoshi Hirakawa's new installation - a fusion of imagery, sound and body expression conceived with the aim to explore new horizons in artistic expression. The installation integrates elements of light, imagery and sound that together contain the manifestation of spiritual energy and human awareness. The visitor generates through his activate participation various interaction between the elements of light (sunbeams falling through trees), music and video footage inspired by a single woman's subtle feelings and behavior.
Composer/musician Michael Rother and dancer Yoko Ando took charge of the creation of visuals and sounds that, in concert with the dynamics of light, define the piece's distinctive flavor. Their residence at YCAM was for the three artists a period of mutual inspiration and stimulation, and we are now proud to present the much anticipated result of these internationally renowned creators' first ever collaboration.
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Movement and spriritual energy generated through light, imagery of body expression and sound
Contemporary artist Noritoshi Hirakawa has been examining individual interpretations of free will to live utilizing a wide range of styles and rather propositional artistic language since the 1980s. This exhibition introducing his long-awaited new work is an experimental attempt to enhance the methodology of past audiovisual installations produced and presented at YCAM, by adding a performance element to the basic installation incorporating light, imagery and sound.
In this work, the emotions and movements born out of a single woman's struggle are expressed through various technology-based interaction between light, imagery and sound. The audience participation-based system behind this work is designed to channel the spectator's consciousness and energy into a cyclic mechanism that stimulates the female protagonist's consciousness and thus animates the work itself. While experiencing a gradually transforming space-time, visitors will be able to perceive the existence of their own energy.

Noritoshi Hirakawa "Insearch of a Purple Heart" (2005, Salon94, New York）

Noritoshi Hirakawa "NH Heimweh nach der Heimat" (1996, Theater Am Turm, Frankfurt)

Noritoshi Hirakawa
"Beyond the sunbeam through trees"
Collaborating artists: Michael Rother (Musician),Yoko Ando (Dancer）
2011 (commissioned by YCAM)｜audiovisual installation
text by Noritoshi Hirakawa
Contemporary artist Noritoshi Hirakawa has been examining individual interpretations of free will to live utilizing a wide range of styles and rather propositional artistic language since the 1980s. This exhibition introducing his long-awaited new work is an experimental attempt to enhance the methodology of past audiovisual installations produced and presented at YCAM, by adding a performance element to the basic installation incorporating light, imagery and sound.
In this work, the emotions and movements born out of a single woman's struggle are expressed through various technology-based interaction between light, imagery and sound. The audience participation-based system behind this work is designed to channel the spectator's consciousness and energy into a cyclic mechanism that stimulates the female protagonist's consciousness and thus animates the work itself. While experiencing a gradually transforming space-time, visitors will be able to perceive the existence of their own energy.

Noritoshi Hirakawa "Beyond the sunbeam through trees" (2011, commissioned by YCAM)

Organized by: Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
In association with: Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Grants from: THE ASAHI SHIMBUN FOUNDATION
Supported by: The Agency for Cultural Affairs, Government of Japan (FY 2011)
Cooperation: Watari Museum of Contemporary Art; The Museum of Modern Art, Gunma; WAKO WORKS OF ART; Gallery HAM; NANZUKA UNDERGROUND; Tomo Suzuki Japan Equipment cooperation: Color Kinetics Japan Incorporated
Technical support: YCAM InterLab
Produced by: Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]

Curator: Kazunao Abe (YCAM)

Yoko Ando new installation"Reacting Space for Dividual Behavior"

2011-01-03T15:00:00Z

Dancer Yoko Ando's interactive installation co-developed with YCAM
The Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM] hosts an exhibition of "Reacting Space for Dividual Behavior", an interactive installation co-developed by YCAM and dancer Yoko Ando, a central member of The Forsythe Company.
In this work, Ando focuses on methods of intellection, perception and communication in the realm of physical expression that she has cultivated during her career to date, and illustrates these subjects by means of an installation to be experienced by every visitor to the Center. Through their interaction with the virtual environment that is part of the installation, visitors can discover movements, memories and motifs that lie dormant in their own bodies. Applying the structure of various installations shown at YCAM in the past to the realm of body expression, the piece encourages visitors to perceive aspects of space, body and movement in an entirely new way. During the exhibition period, the potentials of this work as an experimental environment for rediscovering one's body will be widely showcased also in a workshop and demonstration with/by the artist herself, using the actual display at YCAM.
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Yoko Ando's own body language showcased as a methodology of dance
Implementing aspects of intellection, perception and communication in physical expression
Yoko Ando has been operating in the front line of the international contemporary dance scene as a central member of The Forsythe Company. Working with the Company since 2001, under William Forsythe she developed her very own body language, intuition and philosophy of dance, which have been reflected also in the projects and solo performances Ando has been engaging in lately.
By addressing issues related to the human body and the sensibility of a dancer that she has cultivated during her career to date, Ando aims to generate an experimental environment for us to rediscover our perception of the human body and the surrounding space, as well as the various unconscious movements, memories and motifs that lie dormant in our bodies. Incorporating technologies and suggestions provided by the YCAM InterLab team of experts specializing in the creation of media art, this "intellection, perception and communication in physical expression" themed new installation examines the relationships between body mechanics, surrounding environments, and our perception of these, with the aim to sublimate these aspects into an innovative methodology through effective use of media technology.
The experience of this installation will be an opportunity for visitors to discover and exploit a professional dancer's perception of the body, while at the same time encountering new possibilities of their own bodies' innate movements and imaginations.

photo: Dominik Mentzos

Yoko Ando "Reacting Space for Dividual Behavior"
audiovisual installation / 2011 (commissioned by YCAM)
The installation "Reacting Space for Dividual Behavior" functions as a mechanism that temporarily dismantles the continuity of the visitors' movements and body images, in order to encourage them to explore a variety of perspectives of the body, and rediscover their own features and physical reactions.
Several invisible (virtual) objects are distributed across the exhibition space, to be perceived by the visitor via sounds and images triggered by interaction of the physically present body with the virtual environment that contains these objects. In a setting where real and virtual overlap, unpredictable physical reactions and new perspectives on the body refresh the visitor's perception of space, the human body, and its movements.

sketch drawing for installation (April, 2011)

Organized by: Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
In association with: Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Co-developed with: YCAM InterLab
Produced by: Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]

Sound design: Masashi Heirakuji
Vusual programming: Satoru Higa
Curator: Kazunao Abe (YCAM)

scopic measure #13 Ryoichi Kurokawa "rheo: 5 horizons"

2011-01-02T15:00:00Z

Ryoichi Kurokawa - an artist pursuing the sophisticated art of "temporal sculpting" with sound and imagery

In volume 13 of the ongoing scopic measure series introducing works and projects by up-and-coming artists at the Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM], Berlin-based video/sound artist Ryoichi Kurokawa presents his piece rheo: 5 horizons. In this installation, Kurokawa uses a 5-channel sound system and five large monitors to create a spatial/temporal sculpture. His elaborate technique and delicate artistic expression are highly regarded both in Japan and abroad (*1). The scenery, merging together sound and imagery in a flowing transformation, inspires a new sensory experience of watching sound and hearing images.
In connection with this exhibition, YCAM also introduces a number of related works, and hosts a live music event with Kurokawa and other artists. Their various sophisticated performances will highlight the diverse potential of sound-based expression.

*1) Winner of a Golden Nica in the digital music category of one of the world's largest media art festivals, Ars Electronica, in 2010, and nominated by the review committee in the art category (installation) at the 14th Japan Media Arts Festival.
[In the sound tectonics #10 live concert that takes place concurrently with scopic measure, Kurokawa performs his piece Rheo (2009), which served as a foundation for rheo: 5 horizons. The event marks at once the first ever combined staging of both installation and performance in Japan.]

]]> Ryoichi Kurokawa "rheo: 5 horizons"
2010｜audiovisual installation｜8min

rheo: 5 horizons is an audio-visual installation that inspires a new sensory experience of "watching sound" and "hearing images". It is composed of five flat-panel-displays and five multi-channel speakers, whereas each vertically long visual element is linked and synchronized with one mono channel audio source. These pairs are juxtaposed in line like a quintet, and behave as five independent audiovisual apparatuses. The scenery of digitally reproduced high-resolution imagery, perfectly synchronized with playbacks of field recordings, combines both minimalism and complexity into an exquisite spatial construct of architectural beauty.
The piece that ultimately builds a "sculpture integrating sounds and visuals" can be considered as an attempt to melt and amalgamate such different elements as imagery and sound, nature and digital technology, with the help of a computer. The title "Rheo" refers to the Greek expression for "flow/current", and was inspired by the term "panta rei" coined by philosopher Heraclitus. Like the providence of life and nature, the essential things are constantly flowing and moving along. By integrating elaborately constructed high-grade imagery and sound as a single current in time and space, the piece explores the limits of human perception.

Ryoichi Kurokawa "rheo: 5 horizons" (2010)　©Ryoichi Kurokawa

"rheo: 5 horizons" translates temporal and spatial transitions into audiovisual motion as a dynamic fluid, and builds a spatial construction that facilitates a new form of audiovisual perception. In combination with sound, the visual impact emphasizes the behavior of the audio source, and highlights its motion, direction and position in the space. By integrating imagery and sound, the piece layers aspects of movement, direction, speed, shape, color, weight and texture on a parallel timeline, creating out of these multi-layered elements temporal sculptures within looped sequences of eight minutes length. The spatially architectural forms generated this way reflect my synaesthetic approach encompassing the viewer's senses of vision, hearing and touch from different angles.

Ryoichi Kurokawa

Organized by: Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
In association with: Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Cooperation: Cimatics
Technical support: YCAM InterLab
Produced by: Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]

sound tectonics installation #3 / #4

2011-01-02T14:58:43Z

In this next event in the sound tectonics series introducing the latest efforts in electronic sound and related fields by artists from Japan and abroad, the Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM] presents a live concert paired with an installation.
As a new feature in this series, evala and Ryoichi Kurokawa will additionally introduce specially commissioned works in YCAM's patios, incorporating sound systems set up in the venue's basement. A rare opportunity to experience performances and sound installations at once, this showcase of the diverse potential of acoustic expression will highlight the featured artists' finely-honed senses and broad imagination.

]]> Installation Series
sound tectonics installation
Held concurrently with a live concert, this time's sound tectonics installation event introduces new commissioned installations by evala and Ryoichi Kurokawa, both of whom are appearing in sound tectonics #10 concert, each shown at one of YCAM's two patio spaces. evela, who has earned himself a worldwide reputation for his large-scale installations of dense three-dimensional sound, creates through the process of acoustic reflection, amalgamation and autonomous generation as-yet-unknown sonic environments. Ryoichi Kurokawa presents a revised sound installation version of his work celeritas (2009), recombined in accordance with the spatial characteristics of the patio setting.

Exhibited works:

sound tectonics installation #3
evala "void-inflection"　
new work / commissioned by YCAM
This sound installation utilizes a parallel 5.1-channel surround system to construct a novel kind of virtual sonic environment. Vast amounts of sound data, tagged according to their acoustic characteristics and fed through a processor, autonomously form an adventurous yet delicate type of music. This generation process in which - impossibly to realize without a computer - even acoustic phases are twisted, results in the emergence of a prismatic sonic environment that is neither artificial nor natural.

sound tectonics installation #4
Ryoichi Kurokawa "Remapped extract of 'celeritas' "
revised version｜commissioned by YCAM
With this sound installation version, Ryoichi Kurokawa takes his work celeritas (2009) onto new territory after presenting it in such different formats as audiovisual installation, live concert and theatre. For this piece, he recombined audio sources from celeritas into a 5.1-channel composition, tailored to suit spatial characteristics of this time's patio setting.

Guest Research Project vol .1 Related Exhibition

2011-01-02T03:19:05Z

The Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM] invites engineers and researchers focusing on cutting-edge subjects related to media art, to participate in the "Guest Research Project" and work on joint projects with YCAM's own "InterLab" research and development team.
In this first installment, New York-based engineer/artist Kyle McDonald will stay and work at YCAM for about three months. His joint research at the Center will revolve around "calibration" technology as used in computer vision, and culminate in the presentation of a "projector camera toolkit" developed during that period.
In tandem with the research program, two works realized with McDonald's participation are on display at two separate locations at YCAM.

]]> Media art integrating advanced techniques, ideas and creativity

Kyle McDonald, who will stay and work as a guest researcher at YCAM, has been producing works informed by a combination of advanced technical skills and expertise in the ﬁelds of art and science, and participated in a number of rather extensive projects. His international reputation is primarily based on his achievements in the realm of software development, where he has been modifying cutting-edge technologies for use in highly versatile systems. As part of the Guest Research Project, YCAM exhibits two works in which McDonald demonstrates his exquisite combination of an inquiring mind regarding technology, and distinctly playful sensitivity. Aiming to introduce the fruits of the joint research and development efforts to a broader audience, we are further planning to exhibit works implementing the newly developed technology.

Exhibited Work

The Janus Machine
Kyle McDonald, Zach Lieberman, Theo Watson, Daito Manabe
2010 | Installation

This is a work in which facial expressions of visitors and other persons are synthesized into three-dimensional images of faces that change their appearance in various ways.The mechanism of generating images by processing three-dimensional measurement data of faces is based on the "DIY 3D Scanning" open-source software that McDonald developed in 2009.
The contours of the face of a visitor sitting on a chair in the exhibition booth are scanned in a shower of light, and translated into a three-dimensional rendition of him/her. The generated image appears on a screen in the back, where it is synthesized with data stored in a computer, and ultimately transforms into a variety of new expressions, including those of (previously recorded) other persons that can be of different age or sex. "Janus" in the title refers to the double-faced god and guardian in Roman mythology, and the notions of transition and duality - come/go, past/future, young/old - it implies. Seemingly proposing new interpretations of ancient myths and metaphors, the work highlights the boundaries between the self and others, the past and the future.

I Eat Beat
Kyle McDonald
2008-2009 | Installation

I Eat Beats is a percussion instrument that can be played by placing candies as "musical notes" onto lines projected onto the top of a table, resulting in a limitless variety of rhythms. The work was ﬁrst unveiled as a prototype using such simple devices as a web camera and computer, combined with image-recognition technology. It is easy to play for anyone, and allows for ensemble performances by multiple players at once. This original electronic instrument that can be enjoyed while eating candies reﬂects McDonald's playful approach juxtaposing innovative ideas and techniques, and can be considered as a prototype tangible user interface.
[As part of the exhibition at YCAM, visitors can try and play the "nstrument" using similar objects.]

Organized by: Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
In association with: Yamaguchi City,Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Co-developed with: YCAM InterLab
Produced by: Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]

LabACT vol.1 We connect to the world through our eyes- Eye-Tracking study"The EyeWriter"

2011-01-01T15:00:00Z

Drawing with the eyes.
YCAM launches an exhibition project showcasing and practically applying The EyeWriter, a device for drawing by using just the eyes

The Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM] announces "LabACT": a series of exhibitions introducing creative work inspired by a dialogue between science and art, in a broad context including social aspects, and with a special focus on the technical aspects of media art. This year's program includes two exhibitions themed around eye-tracking technology. The first one presents The EyeWriter, a device for drawing by the line of sight that has been developed in the USA.
Along with a general overview of The EyeWriter project, and an explanation of the technical development, the exhibition features a hands-on booth for visitors to try the latest version of the device for painting pictures with their eyes. A workshop and display of new installation work based on the latest technology complete the program of this multidisciplinary exhibition demonstrating the media-informed developments in technology, thought, and artistic expression, using examples of The EyeWriter's practical application.

]]> Creative diversity and social meaning carved by technology, examined through The EyeWriter's operation
The EyeWriter project, launched in 2010, was inspired by an American graffiti artist's desire to be able to "draw again" after his body was paralyzed due to Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS).
A group of participants centered around a core of artists and engineers from all parts of the world developed a mechanism for drawing with the eyes using open-source software and available devices, the function of which they are continually revising. The exhibition showcases the achievements made in this project that is heavily influenced by new technologies and the philosophy of sharing technology and information, and offers visitors the opportunity to try the newest version, The EyeWriter 2.0. Furthermore, the exhibition includes new interactive installations by two artists, realized using eye-tracking software that is available as open-source software.

The Eyewriter from Evan Roth on Vimeo.

Exhibited works
"The EyeWriter"
Documentation
Next to panel displays and documentary/explanatory footage of The EyeWriter project, the exhibition includes a hands-on booth in which visitors can try The EyeWriter 2.0. After an initial calibration of the gaze tracking function, visitors can enjoy various features, such as writing graffiti or playing games with just their eyes. Through such displays facilitating the experience and understanding of The EyeWriter, the exhibition outlines the project at large, its social significance, and its continual development thanks to the sharing of technologies.

exonemo "EyeWalker"
new work (commissioned by YCAM） / installation
This work allows visitors to experience jumps of vision according to a changing line of sight. Monitors ("objects") fitted with video cameras are installed at various locations and in different angles inside the YCAM building, transmitting images of the facility's interior to a monitor in the user (visitor) booth. When the user spots and focuses on one of these "objects" on the monitor screen, the image instantly switches to live footage from the respective object, which again includes other objects that can be "selected".
Here The EyeWriter's software is used for identifying the object the user looks at on the monitor, and triggering a system selecting sources of live video transmission. Submerged in the images on the monitor in the user booth, the visitor's sense of vision wanders from one object to another, according to the focal point of his/her gaze. The work that stretches our sensation of being absorbed in visual information to the extreme, and creates the optical illusion of jumping from one real space to another. It disturbs relationship between the act of watching and the watching of the individual's own existence.

Semitra "eyeFont"
new work (commissioned by YCAM） / installation
In this work, a new interactive installation version of Semitra's "tFont/fTime"exhibition (2009) revolving around typeface design, visitors' eye movements are utilized for the creation of typefaces.
Visitors look at letters appearing on a monitor, and overwrite these with their own line of sight. The letters drawn this way are stored in a database, where they are archived for the duration of the exhibition. The act of drawing lines through eye movements is a novel kind of experience that combines inconvenience and a sensation of lacking proficiency and refinement. Although made under the control of consciousness, these letters are products of parts of the human body that cannot be controlled completely. The work and the myriad variations of letters created and accumulated in it showcases possible typeface designs made with the line of sight, whereas it will be particularly interesting to see to what extent basic proportions remain intact, and what gets distorted for the sake of new individual designs. "eyeFont" Archive Website: http://eyefont.semitra.com/

Related events
Symposium "The EyeWriter - Perspectives beyond development and sharing"
October 1 (Sat) 15:30-18:00 Admission free　
Panelists: Zach Lieberman, exonemo, Ryoji Tanaka (Semitra), Hideyuki Ando (Associate professor at Osaka University)
*interpretation available

YCAM Original Workshop "Eye2Eye"
October 1 (Sat), November 6 (Sun), December 4 (Sun)
13:00-15:00
*Full tour on each day; number of participants limited to 20 per tour (reservation required) Lecturer: YCAM Education staff
Target group: 4rd grade students and older
Fee: 500yen

Organized by: Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
In association with: Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Supported by: The Agency for Cultural Affairs, Government of Japan (FY 2011)
Corporate sponsor: Shiseido Co., Ltd.
Technical support: YCAM InterLab
Produced by: Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]

Curator: Kazunao Abe (YCAM)
Technical director: Takayuki Ito（YCAM InterLab）

LabACT vol.2Seiko Mikami "Eye-Tracking Informatics"

2010-12-31T15:00:00Z

Masterworks of media art reincarnated through joint development at YCAM
The visualized line of sight stimulates interactive communication with the virtual world.

The Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM] has launched the "LabACT" series of exhibitions showcasing from a broad point of view creative and social values generated through a dialogue between science and art. Following the currently showing "The EyeWriter", in the upcoming second installment artist Seiko Mikami is going to unveil her new installation titled "Eye-Tracking Informatics". This piece is a remake of one of Mikami's most representative works from the 1990s, in which two participants communicate and navigate within a three-dimensional virtual space through movements of their own visualized lines of sight, updated and enhanced at YCAM by reflecting the latest technological trends. This rather exquisite yet at once dynamic reincarnation in terms of imagery, sound, hardware and other aspects, presents an opportunity for visitors to enjoy a totally new form of spatial sculpting by means of eye-based communication and visualized traces of the eyes' movements ]]> An experience of haptic communication as generated by the visualized line of sigh

In her artistic work, Seiko Mikami is consistently pursuing the connection between information society and the human body as a central theme. In "Molecular Informatics", one of her most well-known works made in 1996, the eye movements of participants wearing eye control devices are visualized as sequences of molecules in a virtual space, resulting in three-dimensional shapes drawn "with the eyes". At a time when eye control technology itself was still new and uncommon, this attempt to introduce such technology into the realm of art had a major impact on the international art scene as soon as it was unveiled, and was subsequently showcased around the world in repeatedly upgraded versions. However, as it was not developed to correspond with the rapidly advancing information technology, the work as such was not publicly exhibited for several years. This exhibition presents "Eye-Tracking Informatics", a technically updated and enhanced remake of this distinguished work of media art.

Seiko Mikami "Eye-Tracking Informatics"

Based on the ideas of "observing the act of observation" and "consciously and unconsciously established lines of vision", this installation generates traces of two participants' respective lines of sight. The participants experience an almost "haptic" kind of communication based on their own visualized lines of sight in a three-dimensional virtual space. In this process, their respective lines of vision enact a complex, organic architectural construct that could be considered as "bioarchitecture".
In this remake, the implementation of the open-source project "The EyeWriter ver 2.0" made it possible to utilize eye control technology wi thout wearing any device, and to navigate unrestrictedly within the naked eye's broad ﬁeld of view. Thanks to the contributions of such noted artists as evala and Norimichi Hirakawa (collaborating as guest programmers), elements of imagery, sound and interactivity of the original work were updated to such an extent that this new version can be regarded as a completely new piece of art.

Organized by: Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
In association with: Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Cooperat ion: Tama Art Universi ty Media Art Lab., NTT InterCommunication Center [ICC]
Corporate sponsors: Color Kinetics Japan Incorporated
Co-developed with: YCAM InterLab
Produced by: Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]
Sound Programming: evala
Visual Programming: Norimichi Hirakawa
Curator: Kazunao Abe (YCAM)
Technical director: Takayuki Ito（YCAM InterLab)

Seiko Mikami new installation "Desire of Codes"

2010-04-14T15:20:22Z

From perceiving cells to the coded individual.

We are pleased to announce the opening of the "Desire of Codes" exhibition introducing a brand new installation piece by Seiko Mikami at YCAM. Mikami chose "information society and the human body" as the central theme of her artistic endeavors since the 1980s, and stepped into the spotlight of the international art scene after introducing computing technologies to her critical and provocative examinations of technology and art in the '90s.
Next to the presentation of a new co-production by Seiko Mikami and YCAM that forms the centerpiece of this exhibition, the "surveillance society and human desires" themed event encompasses also a display of Takashi Ikegami's new installation incorporating aspects of brain science and complex system, as well as a revised version of "gravicells--gravity and resistance", a work on which Mikami collaborated with Sota Ichikawa.

Exhibition website: http://doc.ycam.jp/

- Exhibited work
Seiko Mikami "Desire of Codes" (new work / commissioned by YCAM)
- Related works
Takashi Ikegami "MTM [Mind Time Machine] " (new work / commissioned by YCAM)
Seiko Mikami + Sota Ichikawa "gravicells - gravity and resistance"(revised version / commissioned by YCAM)

]]> Seiko Mikami "Desire of Codes"(new work / commisioned by YCAM)

Large-scale installation at YCAM's theatre hall
The "individual" visitor in a double role as a subject of expression and observation

This interactive installation consisting of three parts is set up in YCAM's Studio A, a space that is normally used for theatre performances.
A large number of devices resembling tentacles with built-in small cameras are placed across a huge wall (Part 1), while six robotic "search arms" equipped with cameras and projectors are suspended from the ceiling (Part 2). Each device senses with insect-like wriggling movements the positions and movements of visitors, and turns toward detected persons in order to observe their actions. In addition, a giant round-shaped screen that looks like an insect's compound eye is installed in the back of the exhibition space (Part 3). Visual data transmitted from each camera, along with footage recorded by surveillance cameras installed at various places around the world, are stored in a central database, and ultimately projected in complex images mixing elements of past and present, the venue itself and points around the globe, onto the screen. The compound eye visualizes a new reality in which fragmentary aspects of space and time are recombined, while the visitor's position as a subject of expression and surveillance at once indicates the new appearances of human corporeality and desire.

detail of the work：http://doc.ycam.jp/work/

Production support: Ryota Kuwakubo, Norimichi Hirakawa, Sota Ichikawa, TAKEGAHARASEKKEI

Organized by Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
In association with Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Grants from THE ASAHI SHIMBUN FOUNDATION
Corporate sponsors: AD Science Co., Microvision, Inc.
Cooperation: Tama Art University Media Art Lab.; The University of Tokyo, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Department of General Systems Studies Ikegami lab; ATAK; DGN co., ltd.; Perfektron LLC.
Co-developed with YCAM InterLab
Produced by Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]
Design: METAPHOR
Curator: Kazunao Abe (YCAM)

Takashi Ikegami "MTM [Mind Time Machine]"

2010-04-14T15:20:21Z

Takashi Ikegami "MTM [Mind Time Machine] " (new work / commissioned by YCAM)

For the new challenge of this exhibition, by way of extending the theme "Desire of Code" of Seiko MIkami, we at the same time present a new art installation "MTM [Mind Time Machine]" directed by a complex systems scientist, Takashi Ikegami. Ikegami is producing an interactive work of mind time processes from the viewpoint of a self-organizing, subjective timeline.
The concept of this work is based on the American brain physiologist Benjamin Libet's studies. Ikegami will reconstruct the subjective momentary "Now" by producing an optical landscape of human cognition that emulates the network of conscious, unconsciousness, and memory processes.
In this installation, MTM [Mind Time Machine], 15 cameras of 4 different types will shoot the actual movements of the audience as they enter the venue. Those images will be processed and evolved in real time by the programs that originally developed from the ideas of complex systems. The final output of the images will be projected onto the three big screens, which correspond to consciousness/unconsciousness/memory, and the corresponding sound images will be produced with the 3.2 channels.

detail of the work: http://doc.ycam.jp/relatedworks/index_en.html/

Production support: Motoi Ishibashi, evala, Yuta Ogai, Keiichiro Shibuya, Kenshu Shintsubo

Organized by Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
In association with Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Grants from THE ASAHI SHIMBUN FOUNDATION
Corporate sponsors: AD Science Co., Microvision, Inc.
Cooperation: Tama Art University Media Art Lab.; The University of Tokyo, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Department of General Systems Studies Ikegami lab; ATAK; DGN co., ltd.; Perfektron LLC.
Co-developed with YCAM InterLab
Produced by Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]
Design: METAPHOR
Curator: Kazunao Abe (YCAM)

Seiko Mikami ＋ Sota Ichikawa "gravicells - gravity and resistance" [revised version]

2010-04-14T15:20:20Z

Seiko Mikami + Sota Ichikawa
"gravicells - gravity and resistance"
(revised version / commissioned by YCAM)

World premiere of the revised version
Significant modifications made to enhance the dynamic expression of spatial distortion

The new version of "gravicells" modified and made even more dynamic by the artists with technical support from the YCAM InterLab team. In addition to visuals projected onto the floor, the revised version introduces projections onto four screens that enclose the space. The interlinked visual transformations now take place on a total of five surfaces, resulting in a significantly improved three-dimensional perception from various angles of the spatial deformation caused by the audience's movements and the effect of gravity.

detail of the work: http://doc.ycam.jp/relatedworks/index_en.html/

about this work
The spatial expression of "gravicells" is rendered consistently by the real time calculation of the dynamics. The on-going dynamic movements are composed of the counter powers around gravity. Gravity is not materialized without the reaction force. In this artwork, it is possible for us to develop a new human sense through feeling gravity differently than usual and having new perception of body. The work provides a space with hypothetical dynamics having the opposing forces of gravity and resistance, through special devices and sensors.
Walking freely in the site, audiences are able to feel gravity that they are seldom aware of, resistance to it, and the effects caused by other participants. All movements and changes made by participating visitors are transformed into the movements of sound and geometrical images through the sensors, so that the whole space develops or changes in this interactive installation. Stand or move around on this unstable flat floor (6m x 6m), and audience are participating in the installation. Each participant becomes "an observation point," and another participant joins to make "plural moving observation points." The number of participants at a time is not limited. On the floor are placed 225 units of 40cm x 40cm cell-like grids, in which specially developed sensors are fixed to detect instantly and continuously the changing position, weight, and speed. Additionally, the position of the exhibition space is simultaneously measured by GPS, and with plural linked GPS satellites as part of the work and the moving direction of GPS is shown as the locus. Then the dynamics of GPS is turned into a simultaneously moving site, and thus the installation space involves the outside environment.

"gravicells - gravity and resistance" tour schedule
＝Premiere＝
2004.5.15-6.20　Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]　StudioB
2004.11.9 -11.21　DEAF04 (Rotterdam, Netherlands)
2005.2.4-8　transmediale 2005　(Berlin, Germany)
2005.2.24-3.1　Share Festival (Torino, Italy)
2005.3.10-3.20　VIA 05 (Maubeuge, France)
2005.3.30-4.9　EXIT 05 (Creteil, France)
2005.9.1-19　Ars Electronica 2005 (Linz, Austria)
2005.11.23-12.25　"Possible Futures:" NTT InterCommunication Center [ICC] (Tokyo, Japan)
2006.9.20-10.29　O.O.H 06 festival, Centro de Cultura Antiguo Instituto (Gijon, Spain)
2007.2.22-3.7　Mois Multi, salle Multi et le Studio d'essai de la Cooperative Meduse (Montreal, Canada)
2007.4.27-6.27　el medio es la comunicación ElTanque, Espacio Cultural El TAnque (Canaryls lands, Spain)
2008.4.19-2009.2.28　"Open Space 2008" NTT InterCommunication Center [ICC] (Tokyo, Japan)
＝This exhibition＝
2010.1.24-5.9　Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]　StudioB

Organized by Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
In association with Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Grants from THE ASAHI SHIMBUN FOUNDATION
Corporate sponsors: AD Science Co., Microvision, Inc.
Cooperation: Tama Art University Media Art Lab.; The University of Tokyo, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Department of General Systems Studies Ikegami lab; ATAK; DGN co., ltd.; Perfektron LLC.
Co-developed with YCAM InterLab
Produced by Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]
Design: METAPHOR
Curator: Kazunao Abe (YCAM)

Fujiko Nakaya + Shiro Takataninew installation "CLOUD FOREST"

2010-04-14T15:20:07Z

"artistic environmental spheres" formed by fog, light and sound
Large-scale project unveiled simultaneously in three public spaces in and around YCAM

The upcoming CLOUD FOREST exhibition at the Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM] presents examples of newly discovered environmental creation, realized with an "artistic environments" themed fusion of artistic expression and information technology. Currently on show in three different public spaces in and around YCAM will be a large-scale collaborative project featuring "fog sculptures" by Fujiko Nakaya, an artist whose works have gained much attention at various occasions in Japan and overseas, along with the original light and sound art of Shiro Takatani.
These commissioned installations conceived in-residence at YCAM combine artificial fog, sunlight and sound, orchestrating with the help of originally developed devices and responding to changing weather conditions a variety of impressive sceneries. Visitors can experience transformations in their perception as they interact with artworks incorporating information technology while walking in the fog in the patios or surrounding park. While introducing and reevaluating foresighted art and science projects originally presented at the EXPO'70 Osaka, which eventually inspired this new project, the exhibition anticipates the future of environmental creation, "informational spheres" of tomorrow, and possible creative quests through art.

Related events
■Opening events
Demonstrative Performance
August 7 (sat) 19:00 - 20:00
Venue: Foyer, Patios Admission free
Artists: Fujiko Nakaya, Shiro Takatani, softpad (Takuya Minami, Tomohiro Ueshiba, Hiroshi Toyama) In addition to Fujiko Nakaya and Shiro Takatani, the members of Kyoto-based art/design collective softpad, who took charge of the sound design for this exhibition, participate in a special experimental live performance incorporating the fog, light and sound installations in the patios and foyer.

Artist Talk
August 8 (san) 14:00-16:00
Venue: Studio B Admission free
Guests: Fujiko Nakaya, Shiro Takatani　Moderator: Akira Asada
Artists involved in this exhibition appear as special guests in a casual talk session that gives them the opportunity to introduce their works. Moderator will be Akira Asada, a specialist in the field who is familiar with each artist's endeavors to date. While referring to the work of E.A.T. at the 1970 Osaka Expo's Pepsi Pavilion, which inspired this project in the first place, the artists will look back at such trailblazing achievements as Nakaya's "fog sculptures" and David Tudor's soundscapes originally presented at the Expo, and discuss the developments and prospects now, four decades later.
* There will be guided gallery tours offered during the period of the exhibition. Please check the exhibition website for more information on additional event.]]>
CLOUD FOREST
― Prospects of art-inspired new environmental creation

Rather than addressing "environmental" issues only from an ecological point of view, this "artistic environmental spheres" themed exhibition focuses on the mutual relationships between natural, social, mental and informational environments. Aiming to provide a stage for such diverse aspects of the subject matter to function as interfaces for each other, CLOUD FOREST pursues a contemporary form of environmental creation triggered off by transformations in human perception. The shifting perceptual experience of interacting with artworks incorporating information technology and YCAM's architectural characteristics makes the visitor aware of spatial transfigurations, and ultimately commands ideas related to "environments" of the future.

Fujiko Nakaya "Fog Sculpture #47773" Pepsi Pavilion Commissioned by Experiments in Art and Technology (EXPO' 70, Osaka, Japan 1970) photo: ©Takeyoshi Tanuma

■"Environment" as an art form
This exhibition is based on a definition of "environment" as a compound of mutually generative, penetrative and reflective areas. While there have been various movements in the past that proposed environments as stages for or components of art, such as land art or earth art, this exhibition aims to explore the creative aspects of media art for possible new forms of "environments". Think of it as an attempt to generate with the help of information technology open environments embracing multiple interlinked, mutually "environmental spheres". In this day and age, the concept of "environments" manifested through spatial transformations is surely going to write its own quiet yet forceful story.

■40 years after the EXPO'70 Osaka: E.A.T. reinterpreted from a contemporary point of view
　E.A.T. (Experiments in Art and Technology) attracted worldwide attention when the American experimental collective presented their work in the Pepsi Pavilion at the EXPO'70 Osaka. At this huge international event, the group of collaborating artists and scientists presented the astonishing results of their pioneering exploration of the relationship between environment and art, driven by the participating artists' innovative ideas. Considering the 40 years between then and the present day as a fundamental period of transition from the material productivity-based viewpoints of progressive science to invisible information capitalism, this exhibition attempts a critical review of the ideas and accomplishments of E.A.T. By interpreting such forward-thinking approaches of art and science with an eye on contemporary information society and perspectives of environmental creation, we aim to disclose a contemporary form of reality and its new environmental components.

"Island Eye Island Ear" Project by Experiments in Art & Technology (Knavelskar Island, Sweden 1974) photo：Fujiko Nakaya

■"Environments" emerging out of human perception and networking technology
This exhibition couples the "fog sculptures" of Fujiko Nakaya with the creative ideas of the late David Tudor, who was in charge of interactive sound when Nakaya's works were first introduced at the EXPO'70 Osaka's Pepsi Pavilion. The "fog sculptures" take on a variety of appearances at the main venues in and around YCAM, shown alongside a new installation piece incorporating Tudor's original concept of soundscapes based on environmental reverberation. Altogether, the displays can be considered as a collaborative attempt of new environmental creation, undertaken by Fujiko Nakaya together with the YCAM staff and such post-Expo generation artists as Shiro Takatani. These works utilizing information technology to incorporate in various ways transformations of both natural surroundings and human perception communicate a sensory idea of critical, totally new "spheres of artistic environments".

Fujiko Nakaya "GREENLAND GLACIAL MORAINE GARDEN" (Nakaya Ukichiro Museum of Snow and Ice,Kaga City, Japan 1994) 　photo：Rokuro Yoshida

"CLOUD FOREST"
The exhibition's title, "CLOUD FOREST" is borrowed from the name of a subtropical forestal area that is characterized by a frequent formation of mist about the canopy level. It is a place that can be considered as a peculiar zone of active interpenetration right in the middle between wild nature and the realm of human society.
At the same time, the title is a reference to David Tudor's sound installation/performance piece "Rainforest". Approaching the laws of nature by means of cutting-edge technology, this exhibition pays deep homage also to the innovativeness of the "Island Eye Island Ear" project that Fujiko Nakaya conceived with Jacqueline Monnier back in the 1970s.

"Environmental spheres" in three installations

Patios　　... Interfaces of fog, light and sound
The entirely glass-walled patios - high open spaces that allow wind, rain and sunlight to fall in - are intermediate places combining/connecting the outside (natural environment) with the inside (artificial environment). This exhibition includes large-scale installations involving artificial fog, light (reflected sunlight) and sound, which transform the Center's two patios into interfaces between two different types of environments.
Influenced by the surrounding interior and exterior environments, the artificial fog that is emitted in varying intervals from multiple directions forms convections of various modes and configurations. In addition, a special mirror device is used to redirect sunbeams into the fog. As optical effects will vary significantly according to the fog's configuration, meteorological conditions, and the position of the sun, the displays will continue to take on different appearances depending on the time, position and angle. As locations, sizes, and positions of installed apparatus are different in both patios, visitors can appreciate two completely different installations. Furthermore, special sound systems installed inside the exhibition spaces allows visitors to perceive the soundscapes locally while walking through the fog. Also visible from outside the glass walls are subtle motions of fog and light that one normally doesn't see in the open nature.

"CLOUD FOREST"［Patio］（YCAM 2010）

Foyer　　... Soundscape defined by an intense mixture of sound and light
Exhibited in the foyer, a place flooded with natural light from the patios on both sides, is Shiro Takatani's large-scale installation based on reflections of sound and light [Sound Designed by Takuya Minami (softpad)]. Nine specially built sonic devices - two-meter-high rotary square poles fitted with four superdirective speakers each - are arranged in a grid pattern on the floor in the center of the exhibition space. While the poles rotate at varying speed, all of the 36 speakers emit alternately synchronous and asynchronous superdirective sounds to weave complex sonic carpets. Next to field recordings of natural environmental sounds, the installation uses audio sources prepared by David Tudor for the EXPO'70 Osaka. These components will form a densely complex acoustic environment while echoing in complicated patterns from the venue's walls and stairs. Visitors can look forward to enjoying an absolutely unique spatial experience in a setting bathed in a mix of artificial and natural light.

Central Park　　...Fog sculptures" flowing and merging with the environment
Fujiko Nakaya's "fog sculptures" are exhibited in wide outdoor spaces. Like in the patios, clouds of artificial fog will be generated also in the central park in front of YCAM. Due to rapidly changing wind conditions, here the fog clusters will move in instantaneously shifting patterns. While marveling at these massive formations of fog quite different from the sceneries in the patios, the visitor can witness how these "fog sculptures" flow and merge with the environment.

"CLOUD FOREST"［Central Park］（YCAM 2010）

* Also on display are photographs and video footage of previous works related to this exhibition (Fujiko Nakaya & David Tudor, EXPO'70 Osaka "Pepsi Pavilion", etc.)

Organized by Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
In association with Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Grants from THE ASAHI SHIMBUN FOUNDATION
Supported by the Agency for Cultural Affairs Government of Japan in the fiscal 2010
Co-developed with YCAM InterLab
Produced by Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]

Sound Design & Graphic Design Takuya Minami (softpad)
Programming: Ken Furudate

Curator: Kazunao Abe (YCAM)

"polarm [mirrored]" Opening Event: International symposium "Decennial environmental observations in art"

2010-04-14T15:20:06Z

As a special event held as part of the festivities commemorating 150 Years of Friendship between Germany and Japan, this symposium is led by the artists and curators involved in this exhibition, together with a number of invited intellectuals from Germany and Japan. The artists discuss via a scientific standpoint supposed future developments and possibilities of modeling invisible data into visual or acoustic works of media technology-based art, and explore new ways of perceiving the environment while referencing Nikola Tesla's and other historical achievements, as well as current endeavors in the field.

International symposium - 150 Jahre Freundschaft Deutschland-Japan
"Decennial environmental observations in art"
November 13 (sat) 13:00-16:00
Guests: Carsten Nicolai, Marko Peljhan, Andreas Broeckmann (Director of the Dortmunder U) , etc.
Moderator: Yukiko Shikata (Guest curator), Kazunao Abe (YCAM)
* interpretation available
Co-sponsor: Goethe-Institut Japan in Osaka

Carsten Nicolai + Marko Peljhan new installation "polarm [mirrored]"

2010-04-14T15:20:06Z

* Exhibition website http://polar-m.ycam.jp/

Decennial environmental observations in art focusing on a global informational network's polar areas
The "polar" project centers on fixed-point observations of the earth's natural and informational environment from an artist's position. The previous polar I, presented in Tokyo in 2000, introduced a network-based original search engine, developed in order to observe the earth as an environment based on a variety of information. The updating process was translated into images and sounds exhibited in an audio-visual installation. The following ten years have seen significant developments in information technology, which have in turn triggered repeated massive changes in human sensibility and perception. While considering unreachable places on the earth as more or less non-existent, we are directly confronted with an extensive invisible world of information and other data. The aim of this second installment is to establish an original platform for investigations into the diverse environments that surround us in the year 2010. By searching specific information, visitors can proactively explore uncharted polar areas, and discover their meanings. Two of the world's leading artists get together again to highlight current natural and informational environments, and propose methods for us to apply for their research.
(In-residence production period: late October - early November)

]]>

13 December, 2011 OPENING EVENTS

■150 Jahre Freundschaft Deutschland-Japan
International symposium "Decennial environmental observations in art"
13 December(sat) 13:00-16:00 Admission free
Guests: Carsten Nicolai, Marko Peljhan, Andreas Broeckmann (Director of the Dortmunder U)
Moderator: Yukiko Shikata(Guest curator), Kazunao Abe(YCAM)
* interpretation available

■YCAM sound tectonics #8
"raster-noton evening"
13 December(sat) 19:00 start（18:30 open）
Live: cyclo.(Carsten Nicolai & Ryoji Ikeda), byetone(Olaf Bender), Nibo Guest: Christopher Willits
Admission: Advanced tickets ¥3,000 / "any" members & special discounts ¥2,700
Tickets at the door: ¥3,500
Ticket information desk: +81-83-920-6111 (10:00-19:00/closed on Tuesdays (the following day if Tuesday is a national holiday)
* Reserve Ticket(YCAM ticket information desk):
http://www.ycfcp.or.jp/ticket_en.html
* All tickets are to be paid at the venue on the day of the event.

polar: environmental observations in art
Initiated by Carsten Nicolai and Marko Peljhan, polar is being considered as a very special project. While the title refers to polarity and polar regions in its original meaning, polar^m adds to this the earth's electromagnetic fields, radiation and magnetic poles as connectors between real and informational spaces. Another notion contained in the project title is the aim to explore the environment as an unknown polar zone via long-term observation of earth and data environments from an artistic point of view. In this project, macroscopic and microscopic invisible relationships hidden in the environment in which we live are exquisitely translated into a mix of images and sounds using cutting-edge media technology, to propose a new awareness and perception of the actuality of our ceaselessly transforming environment.

From polar (2000) to polar^m (2010)
Ten years on from the polar installation in 2000, polar^m raises the question how the mechanisms of no longer clearly definable human existence work in an age when the massive progress and penetration of information technology has brought along fluctuating environmental spheres. what does all the innovation and exploration of technology beyond our imagination aim to get closer to? this exhibition closes up on the phenomenon of "radiation" as a method of environmental exploration that is deeply rooted in physical nature. the installation landscape depicts the process of environmental creation from a viewpoint based on the earth's radiation and electromagnetic ecosystems.

Environmental spheres defined by radiation
Along with two cube-shaped structures placed symmetrically on the left and right side, there are objects/observatoria installed in the exhibition space: a set of geiger counters, a radiation generator, HF radio receivers and a cloud chamber (device for visualizing radiation). Various forms of exposure to radioactive rays - including the visitor's experience of the installation itself - detected with this setup trigger minute motion graphics and a wide frequency range of sounds, which ultimately cause a transformation of the entire exhibition space. Along with his or her own individual spatial experience of the installation, each visitor will face the exhibition's central question: Why are there two corresponding cubes placed in the room?

Organized by: Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
In association with: Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Grants from: Ministry of Culture Republic of Slovenia, University of California Institute of Research in the Arts
Corporate sponsor: SHISEIDO
Production support: Media Arts and Technology program University of California Santa Barbara、ZAVOD PROJEKT ATOL
Equipment support: JAPAN SYNCHROTORON RADIATION RESEARCH INSTITUTE(JASRI)
Technical support: YCAM InterLab
Produced by: Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]

International symposium - 150 Jahre Freundschaft Deutschland-Japan
Co-sponsor: Goethe-Institut Japan in Osaka

YCAM sound tectonics #8 "raster-noton evening"
Supported by the Agency for Cultural Affairs Government of Japan in the fiscal 2010

Curators: Yukiko Shikata(Guest curator), Kazunao Abe(YCAM)

Lecture + Dance Demonstration

2009-05-07T08:12:43Z

This is one particularly noteworthy event held as part of this time's exhibition. The artist himself gives a dance demonstration in the same exhibition space where the "Phantom Exhibition" is on view, so visitors will have the unique opportunity to witness how Paxton's ﬂesh-and-blood movement overlap with those on the screens.

"Peace"

2011-11-23T12:53:45Z

2010／Japan・America・Korea／75min／Digital
Directed by Kazuhiro Soda

The 90th anniversary of Shochiku "Actress kingdom-Ten actresses representing Shochiku ""Minoru Shibuya Retrospective"

2011-11-23T11:04:37Z

2/3(Fri) 13:30-Aizenkatsura／19:00-Shubun（Scandal）
2/4 (Sat)　 13:30-Shukin ryoko／16:00-Aizenkatsura
2/5(Sun)　 13:30-Shubun（Scandal）／16:00-Shukin ryoko

2/10(Fri) 13:30-Kimino na ha／19:00-Anma to onna
2/11（Sat） 10:00-Akitsuonsen／12:15-Zero no syoten／15:00-Kimi no na ha
2/12（Sun） 12:30-Anma to onna／15:00-Akitsuonsen／17:30-Zero no shoten

2/17（Fri） 13:30-Sanga ari／19:00-Tokyo boshoku
2/18（Sat） 12:30-Anjyoke no butokai／15:00-Sanga ari
2/19（Sun） 11:30-Tokyo boshoku／15:00-Anjyoke no butokai
　
2/24（Fri） 13:30-jiyugakko／19:00-Seigiha
2/25（Sat） 13:00-Okusama ni Shirasubekarazu／15:00-Jiyugakko
2/26（Sun） 12:30-Seigiha／15:00-Okusama ni shirasubekarazu

3/2（Fri） 13:30-Kichigaiburaku／19:00Banana
3/4（Sun） 13:30-Banana／15:30-Kichigaiburaku

3/9（Fri） 13:30-Honjitsu kyushin／19:00-Akujyo no kisetsu
3/10（Sat） 13:30-Akujyo no kisetsu／16:00-Honjitsu kyushin

3/16（Fri） 13:30-Kojin kojitsu／19:00-Gendaijin
3/17（Sat） 12:30-Mozu／15:00-Kojin kojitsu
3/18（Sun） 12:00-Gendaijin／15:00-Mozu
]]> Aizenkatsura（Soshuhen）
1938／89min／Black and white
Directed by：Hiromasa Nomura
Cast：Kinuyo Tanaka、Ken Uehara,Fumiko Okamura

Anma to onna
1938／66min／Black and white
Directed by：Hiroshi Shimizu　
Cast：Mieko Takamine，ShinTokudaiji

Anjyoke no butokai
1947／89min／Black and white
Directed by：Kozaburo Yoshimura
Cast:Setsuko Hara,Osamu Takizawa,Masayuki Mori

Shybun（Scandal）　
1950／104min／Black and white　　
Directed by：Akira Kurosawa
Cast:Yoshiko Yamaguchi,Toshiro Mifune,Takashi Shimura

Honjitsu Kyushin　
1952／97min／Black and white
Directed by Minoru Shibuya
Cast:Keiko Kishi,Chikage Awashima

Kimi no na ha（Sosyuhen）　
1954／185min／Black and white　　
Directed by Hideo Oba
Cast: Keiko Kishi,Keiji Sada,Yumeji Tsukioka

Tokyo Boshoku　
1957／140min／Black and white　
Directed by：Yasujiro Ozu
Cast:Setsuko Hara,Ineko Arima,Chishu Ryu

Zero no shoten
1961／95min／Black and white
Directed by Yoshitaro Nomura　
Cast:Yoshiko Kuga,Ineko Arima

Sanga ari　
1962／127min／Black and white
Directed by Zenzo Matsuyama
Cast:Hideko Takamine,Takahiro Tamura　

Akitsuonsen
1962／113min
Directed by Kijyu Yoshida：
Cast:Mariko Okada,Hiroyuki Nagato,Mari Yoshimura

Shukinryoko
1957／102min
Directed by Noboru Nakamura　
Cast：Mariko Okada,Keiji Sada

Okusama ni shirasubekarazu
1937／61min／Black and white
Directed by Minoru Shibuya　
Cast:Tatsuo Saito,Fumiko Okamura

Jiyugakko
1951／109min／Black and white
Directed by Minoru Shibuya
Cast: Shin Saburi,Mieko Takamine　

Gendaijin　
1952／112min／Black and white
Directed by Minoru Shibuya
Cast: Ryo Ikebe,IsuzuYamada,So Yamamura



Seigiha　
1957／91min／Black and white
Directed by Minoru Shibuya
Cast：Keiji Sada,Yoshiko Kuga



Kichigaiburaku　
1957／134min／Black and white
Directed by Minoru Shibuya
Cast:Yunosuke Ito,Chikage Awashima,Kumi Mizuno



Akujyo no kisetsu　
1958／110min
Directed by Minoru Shibuya
Cast:Ejiro Tono,Isuzu Yamada

Mozu
1961／95min
Directed by Minoru Shibuya
Cast: Ineko Arima,Chikage Awashima,Isuzu Yamada　

    　

Banana　
1960／90min
Directed by Minoru Shibuya
Cast: Syoroku Onoe,Haruko Sugimura,Masahiko Tshugawa,Mariko Okada

Kojin Kojitsu　
1961／88min
Directed Minoru Shibuya
Cast:Chisyu Ryu,Shima Iwashita,Chikage Awashima

"The Mill&The Cross"

2011-11-23T10:53:04Z

2011／Sweden・Poland／91min／Digital
Directed byLech Majewski
Cast:Rutger Hauer

"Miral"

2011-11-23T10:08:26Z

2010/France・Israel・Italy・India/112min
Directed by Julian Schnabel
Cast:Hiam Abbass

"L'Illusionniste"

2011-09-15T11:43:47Z

L'Illusionniste
2010／80min／England,France
Directed by　Sylvain Chomet
Writers:Jacques Tati

"Frederick Wiseman Retrospective"

2011-09-15T11:09:17Z

11/30（Wed）
13:30-Central Park／17:30-Meat　

12/1(Thu)
13:00-Domestic Violence／17:15-DV2

12/2(Fri)
13:30-Titicut Follies／16:00-Sinai Field Mission

12/3 (Sat)
12:00-Meat　／15:00-Titicut Follies／17:30- Domestic Violence

12/4(Sun)
12:00-Sinai Field Mission／15:00-DV2／19:00-Central Park

12/7(Wed)
13:30-Belfast, Maine

12/8(Thu)
13:30-Ballet／17:30-Law and Order

12/9(Fri)
13:30-Manœuvre ／16:30-Hospital

12/10(Sat)
12:30-Law and Order／15:00-Manœuvre／18:00- Ballet

12/11(Sun)
12:00-Hospital／17:00-Belfast, Maine

12/14(Wed)
13:30- Welfare

12/15(Thu)
13:30-Model／16:30-La Derniere letter

12/16(Fri)
13:30-Essene／16:00-Boxing Gym

12/17(Sat)
13:00-LaDerniere letter ／15:00-Essene／17:30-Model

12/18(Sun)
12:30-Boxing Gym／15:00-Welfare ]]>

Titicut Follies　1967/84min/16mm

Law and Order　1969/81min/16mm

Hospital　1970/84min/16mm
　

Essene　1972/89min/16mm

Welfare　1975/167min/16mm

　
Meat　1976/113min/16mm

Sinai Field Mission　1978/127min/16mm

Manœuvre　1979/115min/16mm

Model　1980/129min/16mm

Central Park 1989/176min/16mm

Ballet　1993/170min/16mm

Belfast, Maine　1999/247min/16mm

Domestic Violence　2001/195min/16mm

La Derniere letter 2001/62min/35mm

DV2　2003/160min/16mm

Boxing Gym 2010/91min/Digital

Special Screening"Jerzy Skolimowski "

2011-09-15T10:46:17Z

11/23(Wed)　
13:30-Barrier
15:30-Essential Killing
17:30-Essential Killing

11/24(Thu)
13:30-Identification Marks:None
15:30-Walkover

11/25(Fri)
13:30-Essential Killing
15:30-Hands Up!
19:00-Essential Killing

11/26(Sat)
12:30-Walkover
15:30-Essential Killing
17:30-Barrier

11/27(Sun)
12:30-Essential Killing
15:30-Hands Up!
17:30-Identification Marks:None ]]>
Directed by Jerzy Skolimowski

Identification Marks:None
1964／75min／Digital

Walkover
1965／74min／Digital

Barrier
1966／81min／ Digital

Hands Up!
1967／80min／Digital

ーーーー
Essential Killing
2010／83min
Cast：Vincent Gallo

"Des Hommes et Des Dieux"

2011-09-15T10:38:09Z

Des Hommes et Des Dieux
2010／120min／France
Directed by Xavier Beauvois
Cast:Lambert Wilson

"Zhalainuoer"

2011-09-15T10:28:06Z

Zhalainuoer
JALAINUR
紮賚諾爾／扎賚諾爾
2008／92min／China／Digital
Directed by Ye Zhao
Cast:Zhi-Zhong Li

Select CINE TECTONICS=15「Harun Farocki」

2011-09-15T02:38:40Z

10/21（Fri）
13:30　Nicht löschbares Feuer

14:00　Wie man sieht

15:30　Bilder der Welt und Inschrift des Krieges

19:00　Videogramme einer Revolution

10/22（Sat）
12:10　Arbeiter verlassen die Fabrik

13:00　Stilleben

15:10　Klassenverhältnisse

10/23（Sun）
13:00　Gefängnisbilder

15:10　Erkennen und Verfolgen

16:30　Nicht ohne Risiko

10/26（Wed）
13:30　Nicht ohne Risiko

15:00　Erkennen und Verfolgen

16:30　Gefängnisbilder

10/27（Thu）
13:30　Stilleben

15:00　Arbeiter verlassen die Fabrik

16:00　Videogramme einer Revolution

10/28（Fri）
13:30　Bilder der Welt und Inschrift des Krieges

15:00　Wie man sieht

16:30　Nicht löschbares Feuer

19:00　Klassenverhältnisse

10/29（Sat）
10:30　Nicht löschbares Feuer

11:00　Wie man sieht

12:30　Bilder der Welt und Inschrift des Krieges

15:00　Arbeiter verlassen die Fabrik

15:45　Videogramme einer Revolution

17:40 Lecture

10/30（Sun）
10:30　Stilleben

12:00　Gefängnisbilder

13:00　Erkennen und Verfolgen

15:30　Nicht ohne Risiko

17:00　Klassenverhältnisse

]]> 1969／25min
Foto: "Nicht löschbares Feuer", Harun Farocki, 1969

Wie man sieht
1986／72min
Foto: "Wie man sieht" © Harun Farocki, 1986

Bilder der Welt und Inschrift des Krieges
1988／75min
Foto: "Bilder der Welt und Inschrift des Krieges" © Harun Farocki, 1988

Videogramme einer Revolution
1992／106min
Foto: "Videogramme einer Revolution", Harun Farocki/Andrei Ujica, 1992

Arbeiter verlassen die Fabrik
1995／36min
Foto: "Arbeiter verlassen die Fabrik" © Harun Farocki, 1995

Stilleben
1997／56min
Foto: "Stilleben", Harun Farocki, 1997

Gefängnisbilder
2000／60min
Foto: "Gefängnisbilder" © Harun Farocki, 2000

Erkennen und Verfolgen
2003／58min
Foto: "Erkennen und Verfolgen" © Harun Farocki, 2003

Nicht ohne Risiko
2004／50min
Foto: Nicht ohne Risiko, Harun Farocki, 2004

◆Reference
Klassenverhältnisse
1983-84／126min　
Directed by：Jean-Marie Straub、Danièle Huillet
＊No charge

◆Lecture

10／29（Sat）17:40《No charge》
Kazunao Abe（YCAM）

"Kebetsu"

2011-09-15T02:16:51Z

2011／136min／Japan
Directed byRyuichi Hiroki
Cast:An Suzuki, Kengo Kora

"La teta asustada"

2011-09-15T01:48:27Z

The Milk of Sorrow
La teta asustada
2008／97min／Peru
Directed by Claudia Llosa
Cast:Magaly Solier

Special Screening"Priit Parn"

2011-06-16T03:24:13Z

■A(77min)
「Time Out」1984／9min

「Karl And Marilyn」2003／24min

「Life without Gabriella Ferri」2008／44min
＊Joint production：Olga Parn

■B（72min)
「Is The World Round?」1977／10min

「And Plays Tricks」1978／10min

「Pärnography」／2005／52min
Directed：Hardi Volmer

■C(76min)
「The Triangle」1982／15min

「Hotel E」1992／30min

「A Night Without The Pope」2006／7min
Directed by：Raphaël Gianelli-Meriano

「Divers in the Rain」2010／24min
＊Joint production：Olga Parn

Bunkacho yushueiga kansyo suishinjigyo

2011-06-16T03:23:25Z

「Akatsuki no dasso」
1950／Japan／110min
Directed by Senkichi Taniguchi
Cast:Ryo Ikebe、Sakae Ozawa、Yoshiko Yamaguchi

「Kakushitoride no sanakunin」
1958／Japan／138min
Directed by Akira Kurosawa
Cast:Toshiro Mifune、Minoru Chiaki

「Yukinojyo henge」
1963／Japan／113min
Directed by Kon Ichikawa
Cast:Kazuo Hasegawa、Fujiko Yamamoto、Ayako Wakao

「Akumyo」
1961／Japan／94min
Directed by Tokuzo Tanaka
Cast:Shintaro Katsu、Jiro Tamiya、Tamao Nakamura

"Tokyo Koen"

2011-06-16T03:17:35Z

2011／Japan／119min
Directed by Shinji Aoyama
Cast:Haruma Miura、Manami Konishi、Nana Eikura、Haruka Igawa

‘Reacting Space for Dividual Behavior‘ Workshop

2011-06-02T06:34:02Z

Yoko Ando hosts a body expression-themed workshop based around her new installation. Guest instructors will be dancers Amancio Gonzalez and Yasutake Shimaji, both members of The Forsythe Company.

Target group: High school-age students and older, experienced in dance, theatre, music, martial arts or other form of physical expression/activity (any genre).
* English-speaking participants are welcome to the workshop.
e-mail workshop11@ycam.jp for more information.

meet the artist 2011 "Library Radio"Artist lecture "Library Radio Manifesto"

2011-04-22T06:41:18Z

The "library" as a semipublic space: Launch of a mini radio station
Volume 6 of this series workshop for grown-ups is all about "radio"

In the "meet the artist" workshop series, so-called "collaborators", which are consisted of citizens, work with artists on one specific creative project over the period of one year. Through their long-term collaboration, participants and artists share the process of creative production, and elaborate profound concepts together through studying about related ideas and backgrounds in their activities.
The theme for this sixth installment is "radio". While referring to the function of a library as a public information and contents provider, the project will encourage participants to discuss the diversity of information including visual and acoustic ones. Focusing on the library as a semipublic space, together with audio books and other electronic media, we are planning to set up a mini radio station at YCAM. In the course of the year, attendants will examine the future of information services in public spaces through a range of activities, including different kind of studies, workshops, lectures, the publication of electronic books, etc.
Lecturer Eishi Katsura will give a talk about the purpose and upcoming activities of the "meet the artist" workshop with the aim to drum up participants for the 2011 edition. Katsura will also give a presentation of his previous activities including consultation services for public institutions and archiving work among others.

Please Send email entitled "meet the artist" with
ⅰ) Name in full
ⅱ) Address; with telephone number, e-mail address.
ⅲ) Date of Birth Year Month. Day.

7-7 Nakazono-cho, Yamaguchi, 753-0075 JAPAN
YCAM (Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media) Attn: educational staff FAX: +81-83-901-2216
e-mail: workshop11@ycam.jp

"Double Film Screening vol. 1 - Short animated film"

2011-04-22T06:14:36Z

Watch it, talk it, and watch it again
Developing an appreciative and critical eye in a workshop-style film screening

This workshop-style film screening for kids and adults aims to communicate the pleasure of watching movies, and at once help participants develop a critical eye. In the procedure of watching a movie, talking about it, and then watching the same movie once again, participants share their impressions and experiences of the movie, which bring them the additional discoveries and pleasures sharing the intermediate commentaries among them. By repeatedly watching movies, participants will learn how to appreciate them properly, and at the same time, develop a critical eye by formulating and exchanging their thoughts.

vol. 1 - Short animated film
Works shown at this event are made by Jiri Barta (Czech Republic), Priit Parn (Estonia) and Ryan Larkin (Canada). They are the representative artists who are from countries with long traditions in the realm of animated film. Another part of the program is dedicated to Noburo Ofuji, who laid his films with the groundwork for the anime culture that eventually brought in a great reputation to Japan in the international animation scene. Animated films that one rarely gets to watch on TV will be shown twice, with short explanatory introductions sandwiched in between.

Screened works:
"Projekt" Director: Jiri Barta (1981 / Czechoslovakia)
"Street Musique" Director: Ryan Larkin (1972 / Canada)
"Time Out" Director: Priit Pärn (1984 / Estonia)
"Yureisen (The Ghost Ship)" Director: Noburo Ofuji (1956 / Japan)
"Kuronyago (Black Cat's Meow)" Director: Noburo Ofuji (1929 / Japan)

Please Send email entitled "Double Film Screening vol. 1" with
ⅰ) Name in full
ⅱ) Address; with telephone number, e-mail address.
ⅲ) Date of Birth Year Month. Day.

7-7 Nakazono-cho, Yamaguchi, 753-0075 JAPAN
YCAM (Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media) Attn: educational staff
FAX: +81-83-901-2216
e-mail: workshop11@ycam.jp

Gallery tour (Noritoshi Hirakawa "Beyond the sunbeam through trees" / Yoko Ando "Reacting Space for Dividual Behavior")

2011-04-22T05:52:00Z

Through the tours, participants will discover together with YCAM educational staff, most attractive features of the exhibition.

June 4 (Sat), 5 (Sun), 11 (Sat), 12 (Sun), 25 (Sat), 26 (Sun)
July 2 (Sat), 3 (Sun), 9 (Sat), 10 (Sun), 16 (Sat), 17 (Sun), 30 (Sat), 31 (Sun)
August 6 (Sat), 20 (Sat)
14:00-15:00 Admission free

* Application: Please visit YCAM 1F Ticket Information prior to each tour.
* Held concurrently with the exhibition of Yoko Ando's new installation.
* English-speaking participants are welcome to the Gallery Tour.
e-mail workshop11@ycam.jp for more information.

"tecpot - media factory for learning and creation"

2011-04-22T05:51:30Z

Programming, filmmaking, electronic engineering, sound creation, software education:
A special place for encountering and experiencing media technology opens

YCAM will set up a special environment for casual ventures into the exciting world of media art through various studies and exercise on practical themes with media technology.
At "tecpot", visitors can attend courses according to their individual interests and purposes, guided by resident instructors specializing in programming, imagery and sound production, electronic engineering, software education, etc. In addition, participants can use computers and other permanent equipment for their own creative projects.

Date: [16 times during the event period]
July 2, 3, 9, 10, 16, 17, 18, 30, 31
November 3, 4, 10, 11, 19, 24, 25

*English-speaking participants are welcome to the workshop.
e-mail workshop11@ycam.jp for more information.
Please Send email entitled "tecpot" with
ⅰ) Expected date of workshop
ⅱ) Name in full
ⅲ) Address; with telephone number, e-mail address.
ⅳ) Date of Birth Year Month. Day.

7-7 Nakazono-cho, Yamaguchi, 753-0075 JAPAN
YCAM (Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media) Attn: educational staff FAX: +81-83-901-2216
e-mail: workshop11@ycam.jp

"Double Film Screening vol. 2 - Short film"

2011-04-22T05:45:25Z

"YCAM Summer Exploration Tour"

2011-04-22T05:40:00Z

Discover YCAM, the country's premier launching pad for information art
A fascinating on-the-spot experience of media art previewing the future of the art center

This special summer holiday event takes visitors behind the scenes of YCAM's facilities, introducing the backstage work of staff members in charge of exhibitions and stage performances in addition to current exhibitions. The idea behind this tour is to introduce the aims, functions and features of YCAM, while cultivating future audiences by guiding participants around the facility and offer a chance to take a peek at what normally happens behind closed doors at an art center.

*English-speaking participants are welcome to the workshop.
e-mail workshop11@ycam.jp for more information.
Please Send email entitled "YCAM Summer Exploration Tour" with
ⅰ) Expected date of workshop ⅱ) Name in full
ⅲ) Address; with telephone number, e-mail address.
ⅳ) Date of Birth Year Month. Day.

7-7 Nakazono-cho, Yamaguchi, 753-0075 JAPAN
YCAM (Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media) Attn: educational staff FAX: +81-83-901-2216
e-mail: workshop11@ycam.jp

YCAM Gallery tour (LabACT vol.1- related event)

2011-04-22T05:30:01Z

Through the tours, participants will discover together with YCAM educational staff, most attractive features of the exhibition.

October 8 (Sat), 9 (Sun), 10(Mon), 15(Sat), 16 (Sun), 22 (Sat), 23 (Sun), 29 (Sat), 30(Sun) November 3 (Thu), 5 (Sat), 6 (Sun), 12 (Sat),19 (Sat), 26 (Sat), December 10 (Sat),17 (Sat),18 (Sun)
14:00-15:00 Admission free

* Application: Please visit YCAM 1F Ticket Information prior to each tour.
* English-speaking participants are welcome to the Gallery Tour.
e-mail workshop11@ycam.jp for more information.

Organized by: Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
In association with: Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Supported by: The Agency for Cultural Affairs, Government of Japan (FY 2011)
Corporate sponsor: Shiseido Co., Ltd.
Technical support: YCAM InterLab
Produced by: Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]

Symposium "The EyeWriter - Perspectives beyond development and sharing"(LabACT vol.1- related event)

2011-04-22T05:30:00Z

Symposium "The EyeWriter - Perspectives beyond development and sharing"
October 1 (Sat) 15:30-18:00 Admission free　 Venue: Studio A
Panelists: Zach Lieberman, exonemo, Ryoji Tanaka (Semitra), Hideyuki Ando (Associate professor at Osaka University)
Moderator: Kazunao Abe (YCAM), Takayuki Ito (YCAM InterLab) ）
*interpretation available

Next to presentations of the exhibited works by their respective creators, the program will include a discussion in which experts exchange views on creativity facilitated by technology, sharing culture and the new artistic possibilities it introduces, and other topics related to social aspects and future prospects brought along by the fusion of science and art.

Organized by: Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
In association with: Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Supported by: The Agency for Cultural Affairs, Government of Japan (FY 2011)
Corporate sponsor: Shiseido Co., Ltd.
Technical support: YCAM InterLab
Produced by: Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]

Dialogue & Concert "The Future of Art and Environment as seen from the Year 2050"

2011-04-22T05:21:00Z

Ryuichi Sakamoto comes to YCAM in order to formulate a message to future generations, and transmit from the heart of Yamaguchi out into the world.

Assuming the post of artistic director for the program celebrating the ten year anniversary of YCAM, a facility dedicated to art ist ic creat ive work reviewing human involvement in society and the environment from a new perspective, Sakamoto aims to formulate and transmit a message to future generations.
In a dialogue on "civilization from the viewpoint of the year 2050,"Sakamoto and cultural anthropologist Shinichi Takemura will discuss from a long-term point of view aspects of society and the environment in the future, and reflect on how we are supposed to deal with environmental issues in light of the significant changes that our society is currently going through. Ryuichi Sakamoto and YCAM, an institution that aims to function as a launching pad for media art that facilitates exchange between individuals and regions around the globe, will together work out and announce a set of possible new solutions.
Additionally, in his first ever joint concert with Sachiko M, Sakamoto will challenge a combination of improvised piano and sine wave performance.
This event will be streamed live via Internet.

]]> Reflecting on the future of art and environment from a long-term perspective focused on the year 2050

New possibilities opened up by art and culture. Preceding the Center's anniversary celebrations, YCAM hosts an event in which Ryuichi Sakamoto and guests will formulate and send out a message to future generations around the world.

In November 2013, the tenth anniversary of the opening of the Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM] will be celebrated with a special program designed to showcase and promote diverse creative endeavors inspired by "art and media" as a message sent out to future generations.
Aiming to re-examine human involvement in culture and the environment from a new perspective, and develop the Center's activity into an urban practice model, YCAM appointed musician Ryuichi Sakamoto as artistic director for the anniversary program.

"The Future of Art and Environment seen from the Year 2050" is an event themed around "civilization from the viewpoint of the year 2050," combining a dialogue between Ryuichi Sakamoto and cultural anthropologist Shinichi Takemura, as well as Sakamoto's first ever coperformance with musician Sachiko M.
How are we supposed to envision the future, and face environmental issues against the backdrop of a rapidly transforming and progressing information society? The outline of this event is based on the importance of a long-term perspective on the compelling problem of the relationship between art and environment that we are confronted with especially since the great earthquake and nuclear accident in March 2011.
The answers on the questions what we are supposed to create for the future, and what art and culture can contribute, which Sakamoto and his guests will work out with an eye to the year 2050, are going to be broadcast live around the world via Internet streaming.

Organized by: Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
In association with: Yamaguchi City,Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Cooperation: Kab America Inc., Kab Inc., Yamaha Corporation
Produced by: Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]

YCAM Original Workshop "Eye2Eye"(LabACT vol.1- related event)

2011-04-22T05:20:00Z

YCAM Original Workshop "Eye2Eye"
October 1 (Sat), November 6 (Sun), December 4 (Sun) 13:00-15:00
*Full tour on each day; number of participants limited to 20 per tour (reservation required)
Lecturer: YCAM Education staff
Target group: 4rd grade students and older
Fee: 500yen

This workshop focuses on the practical application of The EyeWriter's eye-tracking software. By way of simple games including visualizing one's own perspective, or sharing the trajectory of one's gaze with others, participants can experience various forms of communication generated through "vision" - a subject that draws increasing attention in the realms of marketing, psychology and economics.

※English-speaking participants are welcome to the workshop.
e-mail workshop11@ycam.jp for more information.

Organized by: Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
In association with: Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Supported by: The Agency for Cultural Affairs, Government of Japan (FY 2011)
Corporate sponsor: Shiseido Co., Ltd.
Technical support: YCAM InterLab
Produced by: Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]

YCAM Original Workshop (Related event: Zan Yamashita new performance piece "It is something like a garden")

2011-04-22T05:14:00Z

The aim of this original workshop is to focus on and explore Zan Yamashita's interpretation of the "relationship between body and language", which defines at once the method of his own creative work. The experience of a unique production process in which elements of dance and language are used to fill a framework of space and time will at once be an opportunity for discovering a new level of imagination informed by the combination of dance and language.
[Details will be announced in late October]

meet the artist 2011 "Library Radio"Final presentation

2011-04-22T05:13:07Z

The results of previous installments of the "meet the artist" series have been showcased in a broad range of formats, such as exhibitions, publications and performances. We look forward to the outcome of this year's event! The instructor and the collaborators are going to present the fruits of their year-long work at a public presentation.

[Details will be announced in late December]
*Other public events with the instructor and collaborators will be held during the period of the project

"Double Film Screening vol. 3"

2011-04-22T04:58:33Z

meet the artist 2011 "Library Radio"

2011-03-06T03:26:55Z

The "library" as a semipublic space: Launch of a mini radio station
Volume 6 of this series workshop for grown-ups is all about "radio"

In the "meet the artist" workshop series, so-called "collaborators", which are consisted of citizens, work with artists on one specific creative project over the period of one year. Through their long-term collaboration, participants and artists share the process of creative production, and elaborate profound concepts together through studying about related ideas and backgrounds in their activities.
The theme for this sixth installment is "radio". While referring to the function of a library as a public information and contents provider, the project will encourage participants to discuss the diversity of information including visual and acoustic ones. Focusing on the library as a semipublic space, together with audio books and other electronic media, we are planning to set up a mini radio station at YCAM. In the course of the year, attendants will examine the future of information services in public spaces through a range of activities, including different kind of studies, workshops, lectures, the publication of electronic books, etc.

Please Send email entitled "meet the artist" with
ⅰ) Name in full
ⅱ) Address; with telephone number, e-mail address.
ⅲ) Date of Birth Year Month. Day.

7-7 Nakazono-cho, Yamaguchi, 753-0075 JAPAN
YCAM (Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media) Attn: educational staff FAX: +81-83-901-2216
e-mail: workshop11@ycam.jp

sound tectonics #9

2011-04-25T02:27:37Z

In connection with the main exhibition, YCAM will host another installment of the "sound tectonics" live concert series introducing works of sound art incorporating media technology, realized with the Center's own world class audiovisual technology and equipment. A solo performance by Michale Rother, who has been exerting immeasurable influence on the current electro pop scene both as a guitarist for German rock bands such as NEU! and Harmonia, and as a solo musician and composer. One of special guests will be Jim O'Rourke, an internationally operating artist and part-time member of the band Sonic Youth. The other will be Y.Sunahara, a Japanese electro pop musician, composer, and producer, who released several outstanding albums including DENKI GROOVE. Look forward to a set of top quality, cutting-edge sound and music that you will only be able to experience at YCAM.

sound tectonics #10

2011-04-25T02:25:17Z

In combination with the exhibition of Ryoichi Kurokawa's new work, the artist himself will give a live concert with special guests. Kurokawa skillfully incorporates in his performance synchronized and reciprocal action of digitally generated material and audiovisual field recordings. YCAM's architectural characteristics will help magnify the beauty and vigor of electronic sound, to be experienced in spatially shifting sound images and large screen projections.
[Details will be available from announced in late July]

Demonstrative PerformanceFujiko Nakaya + Shiro Takatani "CLOUD FOREST"

2010-04-14T15:15:13Z

In addition to Fujiko Nakaya and Shiro Takatani, the members of Kyoto-based art/design collective softpad, who took charge of the sound design for this exhibition, participate in a special experimental live performance incorporating the fog, light and sound installations in the patios and foyer.

Demonstrative Performance
August 7 (sat) 19:00-20:00
Venue: Foyer, Patios Admission free
Performance: Fujiko Nakaya, Shiro Takatani, softpad (Takuya Minami, Tomohiro Ueshiba, Hiroshi Toyama)

YCAM sound tectonics #8audio-visual concert performances "raster-noton evening"

2010-04-14T15:15:12Z

The ultimate electronic sound experience offered by a supreme team of artists in an ideal environment

The "polar" project observing natural and informational environments, initiated by two internationally renowned artists, resurfaces after ten years in the form of the "polar^m" exhibition. Via an original platform developed in order to monitor the invisible world of data, the visitor can experience polar electromagnetic force from a unique perspective on the environment.
An exquisite lineup of artists from the field of electronic sound art/music will get together at YCAM to celebrate the exhibition's opening. Look forward to an overwhelming display of visuals and sound, designed with YCAM's own high-end technical equipment and setting.

Opening sound live "fmtm"

2010-04-10T02:28:00Z

* Please note that the exhibition of "MTM" in the Foyer will be close on the following opening events: 20th of March from 18:00 till 19:00 and 21st of March from 13:00 till 16:30.

sound tectonics #7 "ATAK NIGHT 4"

2009-03-26T11:39:32Z

Artist change "ATAK NIGHT 4"
Due to member Mika Vainio's sudden illness, Pan sonic, who were scheduled to appear at the "ATAK NIGHT 4" event on April 29 (Wed/holiday), were forced to cancel their Japan tour.
We apologize sincerely for the inconvenience to all those who have been looking forward to Pan sonic's performance in particular, as well as to the members of the press and other related individuals and institutions.

As a substitute for Pan sonic, Ryoji Ikeda confirmed his appearance at the event.

For more information on tickets and refunds, please contact the Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion ticket counter (at YCAM): TEL +81-83-920-6111

We are looking forward to seeing you at YCAM.

ATAK NIGHT 4 - Top sound artists touring the world
A group of renowned artists stop over at YCAM to challenge the Center's top-notch sound and video facilities.

This is the seventh installment of "sound tectonics", a series of concerts of sound art created using media technology, designed top quality of the world-class sound and video technical facilities of YCAM. Artists this time are Keiichiro Shibuya, who returns to Yamaguchi after touring Europe with the ATAK Night 4, as well as New York-based legendary sound artist Yasunao Tone, who makes his belated YCAM debut. Completing the lineup are Finnish duo Pan sonic, and Japanese artist Evala. Look forward to a festival of sharp-pointed audio-visual expression as it is possible only in the high-quality sound environment of YCAM.

]]> ATAK NIGHT 4
Four highly original sound artists come to put YCAM's high-quality acoustic facilities to a test in a sensational joint live performance.

After finishing a celebrated tour around Italy, Germany, Switzerland and France, the ATAK Night 4 live concert lands at the Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]. Four world-renowned artists gather at YCAM, a reputed stage for the production and presentation of novel forms of electronic music and outstanding sound art.
The event's main attraction is the appearance of Yasunao Tone, a Japanese artist who moved to New York in the '70s, and keeps operating in the forefront of experimental music even now that he is in his 70s. Also appearing is the Berlin resident Finnish duo Pan sonic, a leading name in cutting-edge electronic music for over a decade, and ATAK members Keiichiro Shibuya and Evala, both of whom created and unveiled the sound installation piece filmachine at YCAM in 2006, before presenting it in Berlin two years later.

YCAM has been showcasing electronic music made with computers and other devices, reproduced in the highest possible sound quality thanks to the Center's cutting-edge technology and top-notch acoustic environment. Making use of the construction's architectural characteristics, these events are realized with the help of a technical team of experts specializing in the synchronization of acoustic and optical images. Only at this YCAM date of the ATAK Night 4 tour, the audience will be surrounded by an elliptical 8-channel setup that allows for detailed reproduction of computer-generated sounds. Enjoy this long-awaited performance of the celebrated "ATAK Night 4", staged by outstanding sound artists together with YCAM.

YCAM Concert Series "sound tectonics"
Sound art as a manifestation of originality: a station on YCAM's pursuit of new expression and technique

Since its opening, YCAM has been exploring the original expressive potential of electronic music and sound art. When focusing on the usage of media technology not only in video and other forms of visual expression, but especially also on its function in the realm of sound, we can perceive acoustically temporal and spatial qualities that haven't previously existed in art. It has been our mission to explore possible new forms of artistic expression that emerge when reevaluating the human senses of vision, hearing and touch on an equal basis.

Organized by Keiichiro Shibuya (ATAK)
Co-sponsor: Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
Support: Yamaguchi City, The Board of Education of Yamaguchi City
Produced by ATAK, Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media[YCAM]

ENSEMBLES closing live "Networks"

2008-06-13T04:12:33Z

1st set
Choi Joon-Yong(opened cdplayer/Seoul), Hong Chulki(turntable/Seoul), Jin Sangtae(hard-disk drives, laptop/Seoul), Otomo Yoshihide(turntable/Tokyo)

2nd set
Yamamoto Seiichi + Otomo Yoshihide Project

3rd set
FEN [Yuen Chee Wai(laptop, piano/Singapore), Ryu Hankil(inside clock/Seoul), Yan Jun(laptop, voice/Beijing), Otomo Yoshihide(guitar, turntable/Tokyo)], Yamamoto Seiichi(guitar/Kyoto)
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［Organizer］ Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
［Support］ Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education, UK-JAPAN2008
［Co -sponsor］ Asahi Beer Arts Foundation, The Kao Foundation for Arts and Sciences, the Agency for Cultural Affairs Government of Japan in the fiscal 2008
［Cooperation］ sendai mediatheque, CALLITHUMP
［Special Thanks］ NHK ENTERPRISES, OFFICE SHIROUS
［Sponsorship］ Acoustic Technical Laboratory, Meyer Sound Laboratories Inc.
［Produced by］ Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media (YCAM)
［Technical Support］ YCAM InterLab
［Project Curator］ Kazunao Abe (YCAM)

orchestras opening live "Musics"

2008-06-13T04:02:58Z

1st set: OTOMORCHESTRA

The first set is a session in which participating musicians perform pieces of music simultaneously in many different places in the building of YCAM. Elementary school children and junior high school students participating in the sound workshop join this performance.

Performers: ONJO, Takamine Tadasu, Ameya Norimizu, sound workshop participants, Oto-asobi-no-kai, rewall, Ogawa Kimiyo, Watanabe Hideki, Makino Takuma, Mohri Yuko, Gosho Junko, Yuasa Manabu,
Matsushima Tamasaburo, and many others

2nd set: ONJO(otomo yoshihide's new jazz orchestra)

In the second set, musicians give competitive performances in an installation of scrap materials in Studio A.

2nd set: ONJO(otomo yoshihide's new jazz orchestra)
Performers: ONJO [Otomo Yoshihide(g, perc, tt), Kahimi Karie(vo), Okura Masahiko(as, bcl, tubes), Aoki Taisei(tb, flute), Ishikawa Ko(shou), Sachiko M(sinewaves), Unami Taku(computer with objects), Takara Kumiko(vib), Mizutani Hiroaki(b), Yoshigaki Yasuhiro(ds, tp), Kondoh Yoshiaki(live sound engineering)], Ameya Norimizu(noise), UNO-MAN(tentekomai）etc

]]> ［Organizer］ Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
［Support］ Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education, UK-JAPAN2008
［Co -sponsor］ Asahi Beer Arts Foundation, The Kao Foundation for Arts and Sciences, the Agency for Cultural Affairs Government of Japan in the fiscal 2008
［Cooperation］ sendai mediatheque, CALLITHUMP
［Special Thanks］ NHK ENTERPRISES, OFFICE SHIROUS
［Sponsorship］ Acoustic Technical Laboratory, Meyer Sound Laboratories Inc.
［Produced by］ Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media (YCAM)
［Technical Support］ YCAM InterLab
［Project Curator］ Kazunao Abe (YCAM)

ENSEMBLES opening live "Songs"

2008-06-13T03:15:04Z

1st set:    Kahimi Karie's Invisible Songs
2nd set:    without songs
3rd set:    Otomo Yoshihide's Invisible Songs ]]>

［Organizer］ Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
［Support］ Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education, UK-JAPAN2008
［Co-sponsor］ Asahi Beer Arts Foundation, The Kao Foundation for Arts and Sciences, the Agency for Cultural Affairs Government of Japan in the fiscal 2008
［Cooperation］ sendai mediatheque, CALLITHUMP
［Special Thanks］ NHK ENTERPRISES, OFFICE SHIROUS
［Sponsorship］ Acoustic Technical Laboratory, Meyer Sound Laboratories Inc.
［Produced by］ Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media (YCAM)
［Technical Support］ YCAM InterLab
［Project Curator］ Kazunao Abe (YCAM)

Ryoji Ikeda audiovisual concert "datamatics［ver.2.0］

2008-01-09T06:17:04Z

Ryoji Ikeda's project datamatics is an art project that explores the potentials to perceive the invisible multi-substance of data that permeates our world.

datamatics [ver 2.0] is the new, fullﾐlength version of Ryoji Ikeda's acclaimed audiovisual concert. Ikeda has significantly developed the earlier version of this piece (premiered in March 2006), adding a newly commissioned second part.

Driven by the primary principles of datamatics, but objectively deconstructing its original elements - sound, visuals and even source codes - this new work creates a kind of meta-datamatics. Ikeda employs real-time programme computations and data scanning to create an extended new sequence that is a further abstraction of the original work.

The technical dynamics of the piece, such as its extremely fast frame rates and variable bit depths, continue to challenge and explore the thresholds of our perceptions.

"datamatics [prototype] showed Ikeda at the height of his powers, building on his own unique and unmistakable artistic language." -The Wire, 2006

MOVIE
extracted from datamatics [ver.1.0] © Ryoji Ikeda 2006-08

concept, composition: Ryoji Ikeda
computer graphics, programming: Shohei Matsukawa, Daisuke Tsunoda, Norimichi Hirakawa, Tomonaga Tokuyama
co-commissioned by AV Festival 06, ZeroOne San Jose & ISEA 2006
produced by Forma
co-produced by Les Spectacles Vivants-Centre Pompidou and YCAM
supported by Recombinant Media Labs

YCAM performance lounge #2 / Rogues' Gallery Gasoline Music & Cruising in Yamaguchi

2007-10-26T02:51:12Z

You can drive through familiar sights in town while time is felt alive with realistic soundsÑüthe scenery seen from a car window with sound effects of the engine, turn signal, etc.

]]> Citroen XM-X is used, and only two people can experience this drive at a time. Participants experience the drive looking at the scenery in town with not only eyes and ears but also the whole body, along the driving route selected from the artist's point of view.

Please enjoy the art of "space" and "time" as well as the possibility of performing art away from the theater space in YCAM's second Performance Lounge in Yamaguchi Prefecture.

Official website: Rogues' Gallery

● Demonstration + Passenger registration
Saturday, December 1, 2007; 17:00~17:30
Venue: Near by the parking lot entrance

"Gasoline Music & Cruising" is demonstrated.
Everyone who is interested in "Gasoline Music and Cruising" and those who want to board the car are invited to attend.
Note: If there are more boarding applicants than the capacity, they are selected by drawing lots.

● Gasoline Music & Cruising in Yamaguchi
December 8 (Sat.) ~ December 16 (Sun.), 2007
(Closed one day during this period)

Admission: Free

The drive is conducted eight times all together.
(One drive per day: the number of participants is up to two each day.)
The drive is conducted approximately for one hour in the evening.
Each participant will be informed of the details of the drive after participants are decided.
Note: Participants of junior high school students and under must be accompanied by their guardians.

● You are invited to send in information on attractive driving routes in Yamaguchi!
Application period: November 1 (Thurs.) ~ December 6 (Thurs.), 2007

Roguesﾕ Gallery office in YCAM
http://rogues.ycam.jp/ (available from November 1)
You are invited to introduce attractive driving routes and spots in Yamaguchi, online or at Roguesﾕ Gallery office in YCAM.

Please send us information about attractive driving spots for the night that you would recommend among familiar sights, such as a night view with bright lights of a shopping center seen from a highway, or a hill where night view is beautiful. Roguesﾕ Gallery will produce Yamaguchiﾕs original driving routes referring to your information.

Note:
_Your information is used only as a good guide to Roguesﾕ Gallery works, and will not be open to the public.
_We might make a request that you accompany Roguesﾕ Gallery to visit a specific spot to make a preliminary inspection some day from December 1st to sixth. In that case, we will inform you directly.
_Your personal information is not used for the purpose other than Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion and this project of Roguesﾕ Gallery.

*YCAM Performance Lounge
This series introduces artists who are searching for potentials of new performing art. You can enjoy a great line-up of artists trying to communicate ﾒthe presentﾓ through a good command of different ways of expression, including theater and dance.

opening event "Corpora in Si(gh)te" laptop sound concert

2007-09-24T12:58:30Z

laptop sound concert
]]> Ticket information

Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion (in YCAM):083-920-6111

The ticket booking system is available only in Japanese. To use the online ticket booking service, membership registration (free of charge) is required. To register online membership and book ticket(s), please click here.(only in Japanese)
At the window / by phone (only in Japanese)
Ticket information, Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion (in YCAM)
Tel: 083-920-6111
(Office hours: 10:00 - 19:00 / Closed on Tuesday, or the following day in case of holiday)

Organizer: Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
Support: Embassy of Switzerland, Embassy of the Republic of Hungary in Tokyo, Yamaguchi City, The Board of Education of Yamaguchi City
Special Cooperation: University of the Arts Zurich (ZHdK), Department Interaction Design, Zurich Switzerland, Nextlab, Budapest Hungary
Cooperation: The Asahi Shimbun
Produced by: Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media (YCAM)
Co-production: YCAM InterLab
Project Curator: Kazunao Abe (YCAM)

サン・ラ・アーケストラ / 太陽が招く宇宙のドラマ

2007-09-04T15:06:27Z

JAZZから実験音楽まで、世界のあらゆる音楽シーンから多大なリスペクトを浴びているサン・ラー・アーケストラ。サン・ラー存命中に制作された秘蔵映像とともについにYCAM来演。

サン・ラー・アーケストラのリーダー、マーシャル・アレンと、ギタリストR.E.マホニー、映像作家ジェームズ・ハラーが繰り広げる映像×音楽によるスペシャルプログラム。太陽系と深い宇宙の闇を突き抜けてたどり着いた美しい旅が、ついにYCAMに舞い降ります。

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今回の公演は、ジェームズ・ハラーが作り出したミステリアスな映像が、マーシャル×R.E.マホニーによる即興演奏にジョイント。ネイティブアメリカンの彼の本名は、現地の言葉でライジング・サンの意味を持ち、ジェームズとマーシャルの出会いは運命に導かれた出会いともいえるでしょう。さらに今回は、60年代末〜70年代前半にアーケストラが遊び心たっぷりに撮影し撮りためていた日本未公開フィルムの上映も敢行!公演時間中ひと時も目を離す事のできない注目のプログラム。しかもスペシャルゲストは山本精一(BOREDOMS、ROVO)という豪華ナイトです。

"YCAM Foyer Concert" by Tokyo Metroporitan Brass Quintet

2007-08-01T08:39:29Z

*This event also will be held from 16:00 on the same day.

"Street Concert" by Tokyo Metroporitan Brass Quintet

Venue : Front of Chimakiya Department Store
Admission : Free

Organization : Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion

Yoko Ando Dance demonstration

2011-04-23T12:35:26Z

The artist herself will show a demonstrative performance staged in the setting of the Reacting Space for Dividual Behavior installation.

*As a related event, a body workshop with Yoko Ando based on the exhibition is scheduled to be held the event period.

Android-Human Theater "Sayonara (Good-bye)" / Robot-Human Theater "I, Worker"

2011-04-11T03:56:03Z

Collaboration between theatre and cutting-edge robot technology
A two-day opportunity for close encounters with robots and theatre entertainment of the third kind

This event comprises performances of two pieces realized as part of the Robot-Human Theatre project by Oriza Hirata, a Japanese leading playwright and director, and internationally renowned roboticist Hiroshi Ishiguro. The theatre play I, Worker features a communication robot named "wakamaru", while the android "Geminoid F", modeled on and bearing an astonishing resemblance to a real person, appears alongside a (human) actress in Sayonara. Illustrating a new kind of relationship between man and robot, this piece aims to encourage the viewer to ponder such concepts as "humanness" and "human soul". Each of the two performances will be followed by a different related event, including a talk event with special guests discussing the Robot-Human Theatre project and its evolvability, and on day two, an occasion for visitors to experience robots at close range.
The event will at once be an opportunity to familiarize with cutting-edge technology, and explore new creative territory ushered by the combination of robotics and theatre.

The World of Dance in Word and Image vol.2"Talk and Screening: A Tribute to Tatsumi Hijikata"

2011-04-11T03:42:31Z

Rediscovering the history and fascination of performing arts
Tatsumi Hijikata - A Butoh dancer who continues to inspire artists around the globe

This second installment in a series of special screenings focusing on the history of performing arts, and the allurement of body-based expression as illustrated in moving images, is dedicated to Tatsumi Hijikata (1928-1986), whose influence as a dancer and initiator of Ankoku-Butoh has been affecting not only the realm of body expression, but also such varied fields as art and literature. In a dance performance inspired by and adopting the title of Hijikata's writing Yameru Maihime (Ailing Dancer/La Danseuse malade), up-and-coming choreographer Boris Charmatz adapts the philosophy of Butoh, a performing art that has been fascinating numerous dancers in Japan and around the world. In addition, specially invited talk guests will offer a broad introduction of one accomplished artist and his great achievements during the event period.
[Details will be available from announced in late July]

Rihoko Sato "SHE"

2011-04-11T03:16:20Z

Solo dance performance directed by Saburo Teshigawara
A new dimension in body expression highlighted in a refined mixture of physical expression and spatial composition

This solo performance is directed by Saburo Teshigawara, a choreographer and dancer with a growing worldwide reputation also in the realms of visual and video art. Next to appearing in all group pieces staged under Teshigawara's choreography since 1996, Rihoko Sato has also been a solo dancer in some of Teshigawara's works. Her dance emphasizes a highly physical form of expression with a feeling of blending with the stage environment while freely changing the textures of her movements. Continuously fascinating audiences around the world since its first performance in 2009 with a refined spatial composition balancing aspects of noise and silence, narration and music, imagery and light, this piece ushers in a new dimension in body-based expression.

* Planned as an associated event is a workshop with Rihoko Sato.
* The performance will be followed by a talk session with the artist.

Zan Yamashita new performance piece"It is something like a garden"

2011-04-11T02:53:00Z

Uniquely experimental modes of creation come together in an original co-production
A new encounter of "body and language"

The latest creation of Zan Yamashita, a choreographer/dancer who has been showing performances revolving around uniquely structured dance inspired by language, is a co-production with theatre facilities at YCAM, ST Spot (Yokohama) and AI-HALL (Hyogo). This time Yamashita challenges an experimental performance format that incorporates text elements by methods much different from orthodox theatre. Look forward to witnessing a form of communication that is razor-sharp and sometimes quite humorous, by an artist who is noted for his various creation methods and production processes, and in recent years especially also for his collaborations with several creators from across Asia.

Tsuyoshi Shirai×YCAM video dance project"Choreography filmed: 5 days of movement"

2010-08-24T02:51:57Z

Original video piece co-produced by YCAM
Exploring relevant possibilities of "video and the human body" through live Internet streaming

Continuing our pursuit of new forms of artistic expression focusing on body expression and current film culture, the Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM] is currently producing the second video (dance) piece since the Center's opening.
Based on the idea behind one of choreographer/dancer Tsuyoshi Shirai's most well-known dance pieces, "mass, slide, &." (first staged in 2004), this project is an attempt to reconstruct the piece into a video in a collaborative process with the YCAM staff and the artist. The half-year-long project includes five days of filming and Internet streaming of all footage, and will culminate in a screening event with the artist, scheduled for January 2011. The idea is to pursue new forms of dance/video expression that emerge in the process from production to presentation from video images of the body, and from the choreographic component in the visual composition. In addition, the project's outline embraces technical aspects of filming and editing, as well as audio-visual environments including issues of distribution and access, with the aim to a examine the relationship between video and dance in the present age.

* The progression of the entire project can be followed via a special website (http://c-filmed.ycam.jp/) that is now open.

Filming & Internet live streaming:
August 24 (Tue) - 28 (Sat) 13:00-20:00
http://c-filmed.ycam.jp/
Performance: Tsuyoshi Shirai(choreographer/dancer)
* Please understand that we might not be able to respond to inquiries on Tuesday, August 24, as YCAM is closed that day.
Screening of a new video piece:
January 23 (Sun) 14:00
Venue: YCAM, Studio C
Guest: Tsuyoshi Shirai Admission free

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Tsuyoshi Shirai + YCAM video dance project
"Choreography filmed: 5days of movement" test scene (2010)

Tsuyoshi Shirai + YCAM video dance project
"Choreography filmed: 5 days of movement"
Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM] residency video production & screening

In this project, YCAM and choreographer/dancer Tsuyoshi Shirai examine aspects of movement and choreography in video film, and explore relevant possibilities of "film and the human body".
Over the period of five days, Shirai's dance is filmed, broadcast live, and subsequently edited (choreographed) as a video piece, whereas the (edited) video itself weighs just as heavy as the question how the viewer experiences it. This project was designed as an opportunity to explore the meaning of producing a video/dance piece, and of the discussion itself of the relationship between dance and video.

"A Tribute to Pina Bausch - The World of Dance in Word and Image"

2010-04-15T03:17:45Z

Special event illustrating the history and fascination of dance in conversations and rare footage of Pina Bausch

This special program consists of three documentary films and a talk event recapitulating the achievements of the world-renowned choreographer who suddenly passed away in June 2009. In various rare footage, and a conversation with her former manager and supporter for 16 years, the event portrays a unique artist whose continuous impact exceeded by far the boundaries of dance, theatre and art, since the 1970s, and even after her death. While looking back on the transition of performing arts from modern to contemporary, visitors will be invited to surrender to the irresistible charm of Pina Bausch as a choreographer and as a person, and explore the possibilities of the human body as captured on video.

]]> [Screening title]
"Auf der Suche nach Tanz"
1991 / Director: パトリツィア・コルブード / 29min / DVD
※ドイツ語音声（音声ガイドによる日本語通訳）translation: Ayako Kuwabara

"One Day Pina Bausch has asked"
1983 / Director: シャンテル・アカーマン / オリジナル58分の抜粋版／DVD
※ドイツ語音声（音声ガイドによる日本語通訳）translation: Ayako Kuwabara

"Pina Bausch"
2006/ Director: アンネ・リンゼル / オリジナル43分の抜粋版／DVD
※ドイツ語音声（音声ガイドによる日本語通訳） translation: Akiko Yamashita

applications and inquiries:
Please Send email entitled "A Tribute to Pina Bausch: Application" with i) Name in full
ii) Address; with telephone number, e-mail address.
deadline: April 11 (sun)

7-7 Nakazono-cho, Yamaguchi, 753-0075 JAPAN
Attn: Performing arts staff "A Tribute to Pina Bausch"
TEL: +81-83-901-2222/FAX: +81-83-901-2216
e-mail: pina@ycam.jp

Related event
"ELA NAVE VA"（1983 / Director: Federico Ferrini / 127min / DVD）
April 18 (sun)13:30, April 19 (mun)14:00
Venue: Studio C Admission free

YCAM Performance Lounge #5 faifai "A Story of Y O'Clock"+ contact Gonzo's Performance

2010-04-14T13:39:40Z
"YCAM Performance Lounge" is a series of events designed to convey the fun and fascination of a stage production, allowing the audience to experience dancers and actors up close. Held every year in the spring, the program aims at once to function as a stimulator encouraging people to come back and watch dance and theatre performances at YCAM, and to communicate in a direct manner the power of an up-and-coming new type of physical expression. As an additional gateway enhancing the enjoyment of performing arts, a temporary café invites visitors to exchange with the artists after the performances.
(faifai "A Story of Y O'Clock": Performed in Japanese with English supertitles. )

]]> Theatre company "faifai"

faifai "A Story of Y O'Clock" (2010, Tokyo) photo: Kazuya Kato

The company consists of members from various backgrounds and nationalities, most of them in their late 20s. Filling each of their shows with lots of ideas borrowed from the fields of dance, video, music, party and even catering, faifai operate far outside the ready-made concept of theatre, and always make sure to offer their audiences an explosive mixture of fun and amazement.
Generally performed in a freely experimenting manner, their portraits of multilayered identities using cell phones or blogs, and cool parodies of mass consumer society, result from the members' sharp observations of contemporary society. Looking at reality from a unique standpoint, faifai focus on the positive side of things, and suggest through their works to simply enjoy each moment in life. This approach reflects intensely the body sensation and sprachgefuhl of this new generation of artists that are gaining popularity among a broad audience in the realm of theatre and beyond.

Performance group "contact Gonzo"

contact Gonzo photo: Toda Yoichi

Based on "contact improvisation", an improvisational dance method focusing on the direct mutual transfer of body weight and power through body contact, the group has developed an original style incorporating forms of "contact" known from the realm of martial arts, such as punching, kicking, timing and defense. The group's sudden appearances at museums and public spaces that are securely maintained for whatever purpose cause instant transformations of the respective setting, that stimulate the senses of those who witness these performances. The four artists' almost excessive looking bodily encounters propose a new form of communication that reactivates our senses as we are entombed in the safe and sound environments of daily life.
The show this time features special guest Tetsuya Umeda, an artist known for sound installations and live concerts utilizing objects found in his direct environment.

performance piece　faifai "A Story of Y O'Clock"
The fantastic melodrama situated in an after-school daycare center generated a strong response. When it was first shown in Japan two years ago. The play now comes back in a longer remastered version!
Children's interests never meet adults'convenience, but they meet at Y o'clock.

faifai "A Story of R O'Clock" (2007) photo: kazuya Kato

A Story of R O'Clock, a fantastic melodrama set in a daycare center that generated a strong response when first staged in 2007, returns in a longer, upgraded version. The piece incorporates elements of puppet theatre, anime, computer games and other formats, to illustrate an entanglement of childlike worlds and adult rules. The contrast of a child's half-dreamed, half-imagined reality, and the adult sphere surrounding it, will refresh every grown-up viewer's childhood memories, while arrangements and gimmicks that everyone of us has surely dreamt up once or twice make this performance highly enjoyable for young and old alike.
(Performed in Japanese with English supertitles. )

"Performance + Theatre + Cafe"
The fascination of performing arts condensed in an annual spectacle!
Prior to the opening of the "faifai" performance group's latest production, A Story of Y O'Clock, there will be a performance by Contact Gonzo. In addition, the "After Hour Cafe" that opens temporarily after the show at the same venue provides visitors with a place to meet and exchange views with each other and the performers. The Cafe will also host special events for the ultimate one-day experience of performing arts and all the fun around.
Special events this time will be a laptop live performance by Shuta Hasunuma, who is responsible for the music in A Story of Y O'Clock (on 5/15), and "Let's play with faifai!", an occasion to join the faifai members and play around with the various stage props used in their performance (on 5/16).

Schedule

May 15 (sat)
18:30 start
contact Gonzo's performance
Venue: Hoyer etc Admission free
↓
19:00 start
faifai "A Story of Y O'Clock"
Venue: Studio B * Entry with performance ticket
↓
play through
"After Hour Cafe"
Venue: in front of Studio B * Separate ticket required
Special event
laptop live performance by Shuta Hasunuma

Close　16:30

May 16 (sun)
13:30 start
contact Gonzo's performance
Venue: Hoyer etc Admission free
↓
14:00 start
faifai "A Story of Y O'Clock"
Venue: Studio B * Entry with performance ticket
↓
play through
"After Hour Cafe"
Venue: in front of Studio B * Separate ticket required
Special event
"Let's play with faifai!" by faifai members

Close　16:30

faifai "A Story of Y O'Clock"
Text: Yoko Kitagawa
Direction: Chiharu Shinoda
Cast: Mai Nakabayashi, Kouji Yamamoto, Yasushi Takeda, Shiro Amano
Stage management: Megumi Sato
Stage design: Ayami Sasaki
Lighting / Object design: Goh Ueda
Video: Shiro Amano, Ayami Sasaki
Sound: Daisuke Hoshino
Music: Shuta Hasunuma
Costume / Puppet design: Kyoko Fujitani
Diorama：Yui Yamamoto
Flyer design: Kensaku Kato (TOKYO PISTOL)
Photo: Kazuya Kato
Character design: Naoko Shinpou
Managed by: Mihoko Kawamura
Special thanks to: HEADZ

contact Gonzo's performance
Cast: Yuya Tsukahara, Keigo Mikajiri, Itaru Kato, Yu Kanai
Guest: Tetsuya Umeda

Organized by: Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
In association with: Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Agency for Cultural Affair
Produced by: Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]

Hofesh Shechter "Political Mother"

2010-04-14T13:00:24Z
Up-and-coming UK company visits Japan to show a captivating mix of energetic dance and reverberating percussion
This performance series was installed with the aim to showcase next-generation performing arts as represented by specially invited budding young artists from all corners of the globe. This year, we are happy to introduce Hofesh Shechter, a choreographer who relocated to the UK after working with Israel's own Batsheva Dance Company, and in recent years has won high acclaim as an internationally awarded choreographer and creator of pieces commissioned by leading theatres around the world. Also outside the realm of dance, Shechter has been attracting attention for his choreographies for popular TV plays among other things. On his visit to Japan, Shechter will unveil his latest production that is set to define a new set of values in contemporary dance through a compelling mixture of amazing high-tension dance and groovy live percussion.
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* The performance will be followed by workshop and talk session, in which the artist will reveal more details about the piece, and answer questions from the public.

2010 Theatre & Dance Family Program "Naso Rosso"

2010-04-14T12:59:35Z
An opportunity to encounter performing arts for children aged 2 and up

This dance/theatre program is designed for children at pre-school age and their parents. Instead of difficult lines telling a complex story, the piece created in Italy immediately communicates the fun of performing arts through music, dance, and various gimmicks that appear as the story unfolds. Built with elements of contemporary dance and theatre, and a little box that keeps spitting out all kinds of colorful gadgets, this performance is sure to fascinate young and old alike.

2010 Theatre & Dance Family Program "Dallae's Story"

2010-04-14T12:58:57Z
Precious moments to focus on family ties and human love

Based on the story of the Korean War in the 1950s, this piece is not directly about the war itself, but illustrates the earnest attempts of a family to overcome all kinds of hardships. Korean traditional music, glamorous sets, and a uniquely vivid combination of human performers and puppets make for an exciting performance that appeals to both children and their parents. Look forward to a topical piece that graphically conveys the magnificence and importance of love between human individuals and family members.

Megumi Nakamura & Yasuyuki Shuto dance performance

2010-04-14T12:57:36Z
Artistically and technically distinguished dancers from Japan and abroad provide hints for defining contemporary dance and its fascination

This performance focuses on the technically advanced and artistically diverse skills of physical expression of dancer/choreographer Megumi Nakamura and dancer Yasuyuki Shuto. Building their careers on a solid foundation of Classical ballet under such internationally renowned masters of choreographers as Jirí Kylián and Maurice Béjart respectively, both Nakamura and Shuto have vaulted their acquired techniques into spheres of truly unique art. Their works highlight the beauty of dance itself while hinting at the diversity and potential of artistic expression, inviting the viewer to explore the creative nature of studying and experiencing dance and other forms of body expression, and ponder the meaning of originality, stringency and reality in the realm of dance. Here are two artists who have come to make something as seemingly unintelligible as contemporary dance accessible to a broad audience.
* A talk session with the performers is planned as related event.

Tsuyoshi Shirai×YCAM video dance project"Choreography filmed: 5days of movement" - Presentation of a new video piece

2010-04-13T13:06:27Z
Focusing on dance and other forms of body expression by way of video Volume two in YCAM's original video dance production & screening series

In this second installment, choreographer/dancer Tsuyoshi Shirai will make use of YCAM's technology and creative environment to realize a new video dance piece. Through a filmed version of one of his most well-known works, "mass, slide, &." (2004), Shirai redefines dance from a viewpoint that differs from a conventional stage production, while exploring the refined and dynamic movements of the human body.
Next to unveiling a new video piece created in the course of this project, this event looks back on the project by way of a talk session with the artist and guests. Also introduced are various examples of previous works that illustrate the possibilities of dance expressed on film.

Tsuyoshi Shirai×YCAM video dance project
"Choreography filmed: 5days of movement" project website
http://c-filmed.ycam.jp/index_en.html

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"Choreography filmed: 5days of movement" -
Presentation of a new video piece

Next to unveiling a new video piece created in the course of this project, this event looks back on the project by way of a talk session with the artist and guests. Also introduced are various examples of previous works that illustrate the possibilities of dance expressed on film.

Part 1: A half-century of dance and video
Introducing various concrete projects and video pieces, this part of the event demonstrates the transition of imagery and "dance" related technologies, environments and forms of expression, evolving from traditional cinema to promotion videos, the emergence of video art and online contents.　
Video selection / commentator: Naoto Iina（stage director, film maker, producer）

Part 2: New video screening and talk session with Tsuyoshi Shirai
Tsuyoshi Shirai unveils his brand new video created in the course of this project, and review the project in an "imagery and the human body" themed talk session with special guest Keisuke Kitano. Together they will discuss environmental and physical aspects involved in the appreciation of video and the experience of dance today, in consideration of the reception of images in information society, and the idea of the human body in the age of the network.
Guests: Tsuyoshi Shirai (Choreographer, Dancer), Keisuke Kitano（Film Theory, Culture and Representation Theory / Professor of Image Arts and Sciences, Ritsumeikan University）

Organized by: Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
In association with: Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Cooperation: HiWood
Produced by: Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]

Hiroaki Umeda "Holistic Strata" (world premiere)

2010-04-13T12:47:02Z
*Special website http://holistic-strata.ycam.jp/

YCAM performing arts original production 2010 unveiled!
The criticality of perception highlighted in a spectacle of light, sound, and the human body

Hiroaki Umeda, a choreographer who has been attracting attention in Japan and abroad with his "visual performances" blending imagery, sound and dance, presents his brand new dance piece at the Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]. Holistic Strata is a YCAM original production developed with the Center's expert staff during the artist's stay in Yamaguchi, with the aim to break new ground in the filed of body expression integrating media technology.
Based on his own set designs mixing imagery and sound, Hiroaki Umeda equivalently combines in his pieces elements of light, sound, and the human body. For his audiences, these performances are opportunities to experience their own bodies' primary reactions triggered by intensely stimulating light and sound. Visitors to the performance at YCAM are likely to witness another leap forward by the choreographer who has been harnessing information technology to conquer the world with nothing but his body and a computer. Look forward to a novel type of performance that will rock your body senses and challenge your perception.

]]> Hiroaki Umeda takes charge not only of the parts of choreography and dance, but designs also the optical and acoustic aspects of his stage productions. Interested in the effects of visual impact on the audience, he creates stimulating settings of intense lights and colors, which he synchronizes with his own improvised dance to great acclaim especially in Europe and the USA. Most recently he was awarded an Honorary Mention for Adapting for Distortion at the Ars Electronica media art festival (digital music & sound art category), and enjoys a growing international reputation in various fields beyond the boundaries of dance.

"Adapting for Distortion" (2008)　photo: Alex

Holistic Strata:
Layers of light, sound, and the human body

Spatial exercise by physical data - Engulfing the audience with sharp imagination
In addition to the characteristic elements of light and sound in his previous works, Hiroaki Umeda's new piece Holistic Strata introduces a new system built around a key component of "physical data" generated by the dancer's body and its movements. During his two-month residency at YCAM, Umeda's creative work with an eye to touring the result on a global scale was based on the development of technologies and plans according to the piece's concept, assisted by the YCAM InterLab team of media art specialists.
A further leap forward from Umeda's tried and tested concept of treating light, sound and the human body as equivalent means of expression on stage, Holistic Strata revolves around the body as a complex cluster of information that configures actual spaces. The conversion into data for manipulating light and sound of dancer Umeda's body data (movements of muscles and locomotion coordinates) with the help of sensing technology results in the creation of a scenery that integrates dance, sound, and intensely blinking light. It will be challenging to see how the data of the body, broken up into the same information units (bit) as light and sound, will be represented in the viewer's perception when Umeda implants his improvised dance in the surrounding space, or lets it arise right in front of the audience. Based on this system of freely generated imagination, Holistic Strata proposes "dance" as a spatial expression, while highlighting the criticality of our perception.

Talk event * Talk events after each performance
* Admission only with performance ticket
Talk events with Hiroaki Umeda will take place after each performance. On February 19 (Sat), Umeda will discuss the main appeal of Holistic Strata, while the event on the following day will include a presentation introducing the technology used in the piece.
* Japanese only

"Haptic" (2008)　photo: Bertrand Baudry

"while going to a condition" (2002) photo: Shin Yamagata

Organized by: Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
In association with: Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Grants from: Japan Foundation for Regional Art-Activities (JAFRA),
THE SEASON FOUNDATION, EU-Japan Fest Japan Committee
Equipment cooperation: Color Kinetics Japan Incorporated
Supported by the Agency for Cultural Affairs Government of Japan in the fiscal 2010
Co-developed with: YCAM InterLab
Produced by: Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]

Chelfitsch performance (new piece) "A Sonic Life of The Giant Tortoise"

2010-04-11T13:10:22Z
The company presents their newest piece at YCAM
Beyond the "real" connection between language and body

Having received among others the Kishida Kunio Drama Award for "Five Days in March", a theatre piece that was staged at YCAM in 2007, Toshiki Okada keeps exerting an immeasurable influence on the current performing arts scene as a playwright and stage director. His pieces combining dialogues symbolic of today's youth culture with somewhat noisy physical exaggerations of daily routine are highly regarded in theatre circles and various other fields. With the performance of this long-awaited new piece, Okada considers a further development beyond the "real" kind of artistic expression he has established as a means to examine the contemporary relationship between body and language. * After the performance, the artist will appear in a talk session introducing the piece's main points of appeal.
* In conjunction with the performance, a workshop with playwright and director Toshiki Okada is scheduled for 3/6 (Sun).

LabACT vol.2 Seiko Mikami "Eye-Tracking Informatics" (2011.11.4 release)

2011-12-08T09:50:25Z

Dialogue & Concert "The Future of Art and Environment as seen from the Year 2050"(2011.10.31 release)

2011-11-30T09:41:39Z

Guest Research Project vol .1 - Projecter Camera Toolkit (2011.9.8 release)

2011-11-23T02:56:09Z

LabACT vol.1 We connect to the world through our eyes- Eye-Tracking study "The EyeWriter" (2011.9.16 release)

2011-10-02T06:45:03Z

scopic measure #13 Ryoichi Kurokawa "rheo: 5 horizons" (2011.8.24 release)

2011-10-02T06:41:54Z

Live Concer t Series - sound tectonics #10 / Installation Series (commissioned by YCAM)- sound tectonics installation (2011.8.24 release)

2011-10-02T06:37:57Z

YCAM Research and Development "YCAM InterLab Camp vol. 2 - TECHTILE" (2011.7.23)

2011-08-05T10:44:13Z

Noritoshi Hirakawa "Beyond the sunbeam through trees"（commissioned by YCAM) (2011.5.8)

2011-05-28T09:44:33Z

Yoko Ando "Reacting Space for Dividual Behavior" (commissioned by YCAM) (2011.5.9)

2011-05-28T09:40:01Z

Carsten Nicolai + Marko Peljhan "polar m [mirrored]" (Commissioned by YCAM) (2011.01.08)

2011-01-09T01:31:16Z

Fujiko Nakaya + Shiro Takatani new installation "CLOUD FOREST" (2010.7.01)

2010-07-21T14:58:49Z

OPENING EVENTS - Fujiko Nakaya + Shiro Takatani new installation "CLOUD FOREST"

2010-07-21T14:42:55Z
It is our great pleasure to announce "CLOUD FOREST" an exhibition proposing new forms of environmental creation through a fusion of artistic expression and technology, at Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM].

Located at three main venues in and around the YCAM building, the exhibition features the "fog sculptures" of Fujiko Nakaya, who has frequently exhibited her works to great international acclaim, coupled with Shiro Takatani' s creations using light and sound. The resulting large-scale installation project unfolded in a novel form of collaboration combining the elements each artist specializes in. e interaction with information technology, along with various sensuous and spatial transformations, will suggest new forms of environmental creation to those who witness the various appearances of these installations mixing arti cial fog, sunlight and sound. e exhibition is at once an occasion to introduce and reevaluate E.A.T's foresighted art and science projects originally presented at the EXPO '70 Osaka, which eventually inspired this new project, while exploring the possibility of creative quests through art.
Look forward to a prospect of future "artistic environmental spheres" emerging from contemporary informational environments, illustrated by means of commissioned original works created in-residency at YCAM.

■OPENING EVENTS
Demonstrative Performance
August 7 (sat) 19:00-20:00
Venue: Foyer, Patios　Admission free
Performance: Fujiko Nakaya, Shiro Takatani, softpad (Takuya Minami, Tomohiro Ueshiba, Hiroshi Toyama)
In addition to Fujiko Nakaya and Shiro Takatani, the members of Kyoto-based art/design collective softpad, who took charge of the sound design for this exhibition, participate in a special experimental live performance incorporating the fog, light and sound installations in the patios and foyer.

Artist Talk
August 8 (sun) 14:00-16:00
Venue: Studio B　Admission free
Guests: Fujiko Nakaya, Shiro Takatani
Moderator: Akira Asada
Artists involved in this exhibition appear as special guests in a casual talk session that gives them the opportunity to introduce their works. Moderator will be Akira Asada, a specialist in the field who is familiar with each artist's endeavors to date. While referring to the work of E.A.T. at the 1970 Osaka Expo's Pepsi Pavilion, which inspired this project in the first place, the artists will look back at such trailblazing achievements as Nakaya's "fog sculptures" and David Tudor's soundscapes originally presented at the Expo, and discuss the developments and prospects now, four decades later.

■Exhibition outline
Fujiko Nakaya + Shiro Takatani 　"CLOUD FOREST"
new installation, commissioned by YCAM
August 7 (sat) - October 17 (sun), 2010
10:00-19:00（in August -20:00）
Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM] Patio, Foyer, Central Park
Admission free
Closed Tuesday * Cancelled in case of rain at the Central Park

* There will be guided gallery tours offered during the period of the exhibition. Please check the website for more information on additional event.
* Please notice that the artworks cannot be viewed as part of the regular exhibition between 17:00 and 20:00 on August 7th, as the performance on this day takes place in the patios and foyer.

Fujiko Nakaya + Shiro Takataninew installation "CLOUD FOREST"

2010-07-01T14:41:12Z
http://www.ycam.jp/en/art/2010/04/fujiko-nakaya-shiro-takatani-n.html

Seiko Mikami new installation "Desire of Codes"

2010-03-20T04:17:44Z
http://www.ycam.jp/en/art/2010/04/seiko-mikami-desire-of-codes.html

The exhibition period for Keiichiro Shibuya＋evala "for maria installation version" has been extended.

2010-01-28T00:00:00Z
The exhibition period for Keiichiro Shibuya＋evala new sound installation "for maria installation version" has been extended.

The new exhibition period for Keiichiro Shibuya＋evala new sound installation "for maria installation version" is; October 1(Thu.), 2009 - June 6 (Sun), 2010
(The last day has been extended from January 31 to June 6)

During the term, you can appreciate forthcoming exhibition, Seiko Mikami "Desire of Codes" starting on March 20, so please come to YCAM and enjoy the works.

Keiichiro Shibuya＋evala new sound installation "for maria installation version"
October 1 (Thu.), 2009 - June 6 (Sun), 2010
10:00-20:00
Closed: Tuesday (the next days if it falls on a holiday)
Keiichiro Shibuya＋evala new sound installation "for maria installation version"