Seiko Mikami
New installation “Desire of Codes”
20 March – 6 June 2010
10:00-19:00
Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media (YCAM)
7-7 Nakazono-cho, Yamaguchi, 7530075 JAPAN
TEL: +81-83-901-2222
e-mail: information [at] ycam.jp
The desire of encoding vs. the human body’s refusal of being coded
Seiko Mikami creates precise depictions of the gradually transforming relationship between information technology and sensory perception in artworks focusing from unique perspectives on the human body and its forms of existence. This retrospective overview of her activities is a large-scale solo exhibition centering around a new installation piece (commissioned by and created at YCAM), shown here along with two related new works.
The new piece titled “Desire of Codes”, exhibited at YCAM’s Studio A with 3 different pieces. One is consists of a wall installation of objects responding to the movements of audiences, “laser projector” was equipped with 6 robot arms are follow the movement of the audience from the ceiling and special 3.5m screen that resembles an insect’s multifaceted eye.
The entire inorganic apparatus begins to move like a wriggling living being according to the motion detected by built-in small surveillance camera in the exhibition space. The images recorded by these cameras are mixed with footage from surveillance cameras installed at places around the world. Create own database of audience’s images the resulting fragmentary recombinations of time and space are projected onto a large insect eyes compound screen.
The central theme of this exhibition is the state of a society in which programming languages, genetic codes, personal information, and even matters of individual interest and taste are being converted into codes. Audience who experience this artwork stands face to face with his or her own observed and encoded existence, the resulting data/codes, and ultimately, the repercussions of “the body as data” and “the desire of codes.” By turning the audiences bodies into both the objects of observation and artistic expression, this work aims to redefine our position in a time when all kinds of environments – including those of everyday life- are increasingly being information oriented society.
Admission free
- 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)
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)
About YCAM
YCAM [Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media] is a cultural complex that opened in November 2003 with a theater, exhibition spaces and a small cinema, in addition to the central municipal public library. This shared platform for media technology has hosted theater and dance performances, art exhibitions, film screenings, music/sound events, workshops, and lectures.
Work in-residence and traveling exhibitions/performances of original pieces
YCAM’s most outstanding feature is that not only existing, internationally recognized works of art are being introduced here, but the Center also produces and exhibits works developed in artist residencies. Several artists have so far produced works of international acclaim in collaboration with YCAM’s own production section, the YCAM InterLab. The facility’s unique educational activities provide Yamaguchi citizens with opportunities to nurture their imaginative faculties and media literacy by stimulating their thoughts about art and technology.
YCAM’s objectives are to connect the Yamaguchi region to the world, and via the key concepts of “creative understanding, “creative methods”, and “creative environments”, serve as a platform for people to meet, discuss, and ultimately create and communicate novel forms of information art.
