In its fourth press conference at the Yokohama Museum of Art on 22 April 2014, the organisers of Yokohama Triennale 2014 announced a detailed list of 62 confirmed participating artists, with predominantly Japanese artists representing Asia.
Yasumasa Morimura, Artistic Director of the Yokohama Triennale, announced the 2014 theme “Sailing into the Sea of Oblivion” on 21 May in Yokohama, Japan. Image courtesy Ken Kato.
The Yokohama Triennale, one of Japan’s most prominent festivals of contemporary art, will be held from 1 August to 3 November 2014 under the artistic direction of Morimura Yasumasa.
In a press release [PDF download] following the Triennale Organising Committee’s fourth press conference, a confirmed list of 62 participating artists and groups from nineteen countries was revealed, with more artists expected to announce their participation in the coming weeks. The list includes nearly twenty Japanese artists.
A sea of oblivion
The Triennale will be hosted at two primary venues: the Yokohama Museum of Art and the Shinko Pier Exhibition Hall. The title of the Triennale is “ART Fahrenheit 451: Sailing into the sea of oblivion.”
In the press release, Osaka Eriko, Director of the Yokohama Museum of Art and Chairperson of the organising committee for the Yokohama Triennale, said:
This Triennale will be somewhat different from those of past years, with a large number of works which focus on the things that are essential but have been forgotten and compel us to quietly gaze and contemplate on their existence.
The exhibition, she says, will be “structured like a book composed of two introductions and eleven chapters.”
Ugo Rondinone, ‘Our Magic Hour’, 2003, at Yokohama Triennale 2011. Photo by Greg Weight. Image courtesy the artist and Galerie Eva Presenhuber.
Asia predominantly represented by Japanese artists
“Introduction: Unmonumental Monuments” features an outdoor sculpture, Love, by South Korean artist Gimhongsok. Located in front of the Yokohama Museum of Art, it is a “warped appropriation of Robert Indiana’s iconic sculpture” of the same name, commenting ironically upon the status of public sculptures as monuments loved by all.
Japanese painter Kimura Hiroshi, known for his text art and colourful use of fonts, will present a set of four paintings entitled “Language”, alongside other international artists in the section “Chapter 1: Listening to Silence and Whispers.” Also featured in this section is Japanese artist Murakami Tomoharu.
“Chapter 2: Encountering a Drifting Classroom” is a series of lectures and performances by Japanese organisation Kama Gei (Kamagasaki Free Art University), located in Osaka.
The mother-son duo of Kyoto-based Mishima Anju, the youngest artist at the Triennale, and Mishima Ritsue will transform the museum café with the former’s paintings and the latter’s glass works as a part of “Chapter 7: Vanishing into the Light.”
The final chapter, “Drifting in a Sea of Oblivion”, includes Japanese artists Yanagi Miwa, who represented Japan at the Venice Biennale in 2009, Ohtake Shinro, who participated in dOCUMENTA13 and Venice Biennale 2013, and Tsuchida Hiromi, who will exhibit three series from his photographic magnum opus on Hiroshima.
Other exhibiting Asian contemporary artists include:
Kriti Bajaj
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Related Topics: Japanese artists, triennales, triennials, Yasumasa Morimura, artists as curators, events in Japan
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