<Talk event>
“Art in the Age of Crisis”
8th September 2018, 10:00 – 4:30pm
at Deptford X Event Space, 9 Brookmill Rd, London SE8 4HL
2018 Art Action UK Residency Art Award Winner Bontaro Dokuyama is coming to UK.
Originally from Fukushima, currently working in Tokyo, Dokuyama has witnessed the devastating change after Fukushima Fallout Disaster in 2011. The profundity of his experience has catapult him into the current art practice. By employing wide ranging methodologies and approaches including political activism, installation, video, and socially engaged practice, Dokuyama questions our conformity and dependency on a given social mechanism, and seek to uncover the complexity of the reality which is often hidden from our sight.
Art Action UK is committed to develop these vital discourses with artists, curators and audience.
Art Action UK: Web site, facebook,
”An exhibit exploring WWII Asian Comfort Women narratives of survival and resistance to denial”
Downtown Central Library Auditorium, 222 East Harvard Street
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■ “Assembling“ 2018.05.26 – 08.25 K11 Shenyang / China
Location: K11 Bookstore (4F, K11 Mall)
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“君之代 -Time goes by”2017 Movie data 24min58sec
Taiwan was governed by Japan for 50 years, After that it’s governed by China at just now. Therefore, I heard that communication between the generation is braking off. Because it’s different in the language with which they deal during the generation. So the culture and the custom are also different between the generation. And also old people have few chances of going out for dementia of aging and aging, and its tendency is being accelerated increasingly.
So I thought, I’ll visit a old Taiwanese people who speaks Japanese, and I record the people who remember the Japanese and old Japanese culture and manners and customs. That it’s urgent and important to do.
The young people who saw the video would think how to do in the future.
Location : Taipei and Tainan in “Taiwan”
“War is Over”2017 Movie data 05min13sec
The radius 20 km ”Caution areas”
The radius 30 km “Emergency Evacuation Preparedness Zone”
The radius 50 km ”Planned Evacuation Zone”
The radius 200 km ”Tokyo” -The capital of Japan
The radius 1,800 km ”Okinawa” -There was the only ground battle of WW II fought on the Japanese islands.
Too far to see, Too far to hear
Location : “Okinawa” MAP
“The 4th branch, Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry” 2016 Movie data 18min37sec / Installation
The Ministry of economy, Trade and Industry is located at Kasumigaseki in Japan. That composed by 2 government buildings. This exhibition will be held at “anti-nuclear museum” that inside at one of 3 temporary tents build without permission, located front of government buildings. This museum is built for appeal voices from people to stop the resuming nuclear power plant operations and export of nuclear power generation. After March 2011, Participants of Movement of anti nuclear or “Nuclear phase-out” are over two hundred thousand. Now, the number of people who joined this movement is declined, there make a voice for the anti and “phase-out” for nuclear. Theme of this exhibition is, “Temporary: Reality and Ideals of Temporary tents”. Taking an interview from people who staying at Tents of Nuclear “phase-out, I know what is going on. I will propose a “comfortable living space” as an “irony” for nuclear that still exist, and as a spirit of respect for the aged who tired because of the activities were continued with 24 hours a day. Trying to change the situation that completely choked between Nation and Tents. “Statement”
“Dreaming future”2016 Movie data 05min40sec / silk-screen printing
The motif is an office worker because I worked at a company. At the time, my works was very hard. At One Friday night, office workers slept on the road at Shibuya, Shinjuku, Shinbashi in Tokyo. Because they were drunk and very tired. They didn’t have any day off and couldn’t have rest everyday. However, I think they are hero. So I covered them in clothes like Jesus Christ. We call companies which make employees work over time and don’t give them day-off. So called black company in japan. A black company’s logo was on the cloth. They are like me and my self-portrait.
2016 Movie data 06min57sec / Model of baby’s foot
The only thing I can really do for even a newborn babies to an elder people with dementia, is to tell them “Let us stand and move forward”
“Over there”2015 Movie data / Installation / Photo / masks / The local newspaper for 4 years after March 11, 2011
Conditions of creation:
– Limited to a temporary housing residents
– Materials cut through newspaper (Provincial newspaper of Fukushima) by hand
– Paste the split newspaper on a pure white masks
– They wear the mask and point to their hometown
They live in Temporary houses from 2011. They are called victims but they have their own name and each all different people. I cut a local newspaper by hand with them together. Then I put them on masks. I asked them to put the masks on their faces, and they pointed their hometown’s direction. Most of them are old.
Exhibition photo: Kota Takeuchi
“Even After 1,000 years”2015 Movie data 02min32sec
This work is I got to know their strong minds to keep staying in FUKUSHIMA even though some people were out. The message “This sky above this pole is the real sky” was written on the pole at Mt.ADATARA in NIHONMATU-city in FUKUSHIMA. In this movie, I keep screaming “This sky is the real !!” while I was pelted by nuclear fallout.
“1/150”2015 Movie data 02min39sec / Photo / This dolphin’s born
April, 2015 after huge earthquake effected us in many ways. Dead 150 dolphins were washed up on a beach in Ibaraki in Japan. Some people were surfing near that place, and they found one dolphin was still alive, so they put the dolphin back to the sea. But the dolphin came back to the beach and dead soon. Even though the dolphin could be alive, he did not have any choice to die. I saw their instinct as animals. However it is not only about dolphins, but us.
“LInCCAi-chan”2014 Movie data 07min11sec / Photo
Born in 1984 in Fukushima in Japan.
Currently lives in Tokyo. On March 11, 2011, he witnessed the utterly change of his hometown, and he faced deep despair, which became a motivation for him to confront arbitrariness and contradictions that he had overlooked. At the same time, he began to rethink his own life as a salaried employee, who had been working as a corporate slave, and also began to observe the flock of workers, who are made unconscious of their dependency on the current social mechanism. These observations have driven him to create his own artwork. Through creating art works, he has been trying to directly face the inescapable situation and the mental state of people, who “want to escape but cannot escape” in the localities, where media-covered incidents and phenomena happened in the past, and trying to understand the cause and the mechanism of social conformity. By re-researching the forgotten places and memories left-behind by the society, he has been attempting to reveal the reality, and to thresh out new formula to create changes in these places and events. While being chased by everyday life, issues are no longer considered as issues, and they are simply ignored. He wishes to face these issues that have been assimilated and become invisible in the landscape of everyday life, by approaching them from different angles. This is induced by his desire to see the reality that should be present when the society starts to operate.
twitter: twitter.com/b_dokuyama
“Mystery Sense” 2014/02/07 – 2014/02/11 Nao nakamura｜Koenji/Tokyo
“High-nority” 2013/09/25 – 2013/09/26 Mujin-to Production/SNAC Kiyosumi-shirakawa/Tokyo
Written by Ren Fukuzumi
Written by Noi Sawaragi
Written by Takahide Suzuki
On-sale date 17 November 2016
THE FUKUSHIMA MINYU SHIMBUN 22 September, 2015
On-sale date 17 June 2015
15 September, 2016
10 June, 2016
21 September, 2015