Jonathan Meese "Mishima is Back"
at Tomio Koyama Gallery
in the Kiyosumi, Odaiba area
This event has ended - (2009-09-05 - 2009-10-03)
13 people bookmarked this.
4 people recommend this.
Keizo Kitajima "1975-1991"
at Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography
in the Nakameguro, Ebisu area
This event has ended - (2009-08-29 - 2009-10-18)
44 people bookmarked this.
11 people recommend this.
2 people reviewed this.
Tokyo Art School: "Tokyo Resolution"
at Hillside Forum
in the Nakameguro, Ebisu area
This event has ended - (2009-08-23)
1 person bookmarked this.
1 person recommend this.
"A Bright World" Exhibition
at A.I.T. Room
in the Nakameguro, Ebisu area
This event has ended - (2009-08-29 - 2009-09-06)
1 person bookmarked this.
1 person recommend this.
This edition of TABuzz is Roger McDonald, who runs the NPO Arts Initiative Tokyo, an organization that fosters new curators and artists.
I WANT TO VISIT…
Jonathan Meese “Mishima is Back” at Koyama Tomio Gallery (September 5 to October 3)
I think Meese is one of the most interesting artists working on this planet now. One of his manifesto phrases âArt is Not Cultureâ is utterly true and I think he is a good painter. And he was born in Tokyo. Scroll down and read his statements on the gallery site.
Kitajima Keizo “1975 â 1991″ at Metropolitan Museum of Photography (August 29 to October 3)
I saw his “Koza, Okinawa” series some years ago in Naha and remember being blown away. A photographer that I think deserves to be right up there with Moriyama, Araki and Sugimoto.
Kita-Kyushu Biennale (October 10 to November 15)
Itâs organized by alternative space Gallery SOAP on the theme of Imin (Immigration). I will speak at the opening symposium.
[Official website]
Fukuoka Asian Art Triennale (September 5 to November 23)
One of the first Asian specific contemporary art triennales in the region.
[Official site]
I WENT TO…
The first lecture session of the Tokyo Art School series organized by AIT and the City of Tokyo Art Point Project (August 23)
With Yoshitaka Mouri (Geidai professor) and artist Naoya Hatakeyama (artist)
The discussion was very interesting, juxtaposing two positions when thinking about art and society today â one focusing on art as activism and as something which moves as a process through society, and the other thinking about art as something material and formal and the inherent radicality which this can hold. Other lectures will be held monthly.
“A Bright World” at AIT (Daikanyama) (August 29 to September 6)
Curated by one of the groups from 2008 Curation Practice course, a video exhibition with works by Hiroharu Mori, Suzuki Shingo, Suzuki Atsushi and Masumoto Yasuto looking into our âbright worldâ with critical humor and street interventions.
I LIKE GOING TO…
Tachimichiya (Daikanyama)
Natural, cheap Japanese foods, rock ânâ roll, and the best jaco tofu salad.
International House of Japan (Roppongi)
Coffee shop and garden and library â and quiet. (Non-members can eat in the coffee shop.)
[English homepage]
I AM READING…
MA thesis by Daniel Schnick (University of Alberta 1987) on Taisho era Japanese anarchist Sanshiro Ishikawa
I have an interest in ideas of opposition (political, artistic or otherwise) in Japanese society, and the clear differences this takes with European history. Ishikawa and others of similar left-leaning thinking were severely suppressed by militarists in the 1930s. He retreats into a near-invisible, Zen-inspired radical individual utopianism in order to escape persecution, practicing and developing a unique Japanese political agency which I think holds hints for those living in Japan now.
[PDF link]
The White Goddess by Robert Graves
A book which can probably never be read and finished as such â itâs one of the definitive psychedelic works of literature ever written (alongside others like Finnegans WakeâŠ). Graves ponders the origins of Welsh bardic poetry, pre-Christian Goddess worship, and talking trees through a truly remarkable feat of theory, history, myth and fantasy. I dip into it before sleep.
[Wikipedia article]
I AM USING…
Macbook Air
I recently bought this to lighten the load on my various art school lecturing trips.
[Apple website]
A razor
I use it daily to shave a strange small white patch that has mysteriously appeared on the left side of my chin. I had something similar appear briefly some years ago on the rear left side of my head.
I AM SURFING…
ClickOpera by momus
I check daily.
[http://imomus.livejournal.com/]
Ray Mears videos on YouTube
Mears is an English bush craft expert who shows you how to sharpen knives, light fires and bake bread outside.
[Official website]
I AM OBSERVING…
Several art-as-activism type developments in Tokyo now
âŠincluding the opposition to re-developing Shimokitazawa and the artists against Miyashita Park in Shibuya becoming Nike Park, and what these kinds of initiatives could mean in Japan.
[Indymedia post on the Miyashita Park campaign]
The hafu movement
It explores half-Japanese identity and issues through exhibitions, talk events and a website.
MY HOT TIP TO WATCH IS…
The Communist Party of Japan?
[English homepage]
My LAST COMMENT IS…
Are you ready to make the forward leap into hyperspace in three yearsâ time?
Roger McDonald
Born and brought up in Tokyo in 1971 of mixed parents (British/Japanese). Educated in the UK through to his PhD completed in 2000 (History and Theory of Art). One of the founding members of non-profit curatorial collective Arts Initiative Tokyo (AIT) in 2001. Runs MAD, an independent school and artist in residency program, organizing various types of events and sometimes works with institutions and businesses. One of the curators of the first Singapore Biennale in 2006. Teaches at Tama, Musashino and Zokei Art universities and is one of the program directors of the MAD courses at AIT. Became a Japanese citizen on September 2. Plans to move out of Tokyo quite soon to live in the forests.
[Tactical Museum blog]
go
2009-09-30
please qualify your “evaluation” of Mr Meese. What makes him so interesting, his birth conditions or that he chooses Mishima? Does he have an army? Does he really have political access? Personally I love Mishima but i think Mr. Meese brings nothing to the dialogue of Mishima. So please be more specific and say WHY we should evaluate Mr. Meese as highly as your estimation. Will he heroically kill himself as did Mishima or promise such antics and then die foolishly in a of a drug OD like GG Allen?
roger
2009-09-30
yes its a great question.
all i can say is that i was initially drawn to his works through his often repeated phrase ‘art is not culture’, which echos strongly with my own thinking. beyond this i suppose i am fascinated to see how an artist can push this idea of totality, of absolute discipline, in an age when everything must be compromised for one reason or another. his paintings are also like very intense energy balls, full of many different references, sensibilities and pants. i am also sure that mr meese does all of this in the full knowledge that he can only do it within an art world that ironically culturefies everything. as mr. meese says, art is baby, art is moomins, art is metabolism. granted, these may sound like vain abstractions, but i would like to take them and use them for my own framing of art.
go
2009-10-03
http://books.google.com/books?id=HwRB_3WmDxAC&pg=PA146&lpg=PA146&dq=%22art+is+not+culture%22&source=bl&ots=rq0aaFmFpo&sig=ZLJfLeMHmJKMPbrpTyeHAxAOqg4&hl=en&ei=ORzHSpnIF4bO6AOXroGnDQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=7#v=onepage&q=%22art%20is%20not%20culture%22&f=false
I agree with yrou selection of Naoya Hatakeyama though and own this particular piece.
go
2009-10-03
but i remain uncinvinced by “artists” using other Icons for thier own promotion, unless they go beyond those extremes and offer a real revolution not some cutesey pandering platform. What can he do without Mishima’s largess and spectacle?
roger
2009-10-07
Go san – go to the ArtIt website and watch and listen to Mr. Meese speak in his own words about Mishima and the Revolution of Art. With an open heart and generous love.
http://www.art-it.asia/fpage/?OP=mov