Fujii Hikaru and Yamashiro Chikako
March 19–June 19, 2022
The Tokyo Metropolitan Government and Tokyo Arts and Space established the Tokyo Contemporary Art Award (TCAA) in 2018 as a contemporary art prize to encourage mid-career artists to make new breakthroughs in their work by providing them with several years of continuous support. An award exhibition will be held at the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo featuring Fujii Hikaru and Yamashiro Chikako, the winners of the second edition of TCAA for 2020–2022. The exhibition features the works of the prize winners, Fujii and Yamashiro, in the format of two solo exhibitions.
Fujii has endeavored to respond to contemporary social issues by always incorporating the perspective of the present while empirically examining historical events in Japan and abroad. In this exhibition, he presents a new work that looks at the postwar debate over Japanese war art paintings from the official documents left behind by the United States occupation forces.
Yamashiro’s practice has centered on her native Okinawa. She says that she finds the vision for her next project during the process of creating a work. She here presents a new piece based on her research in Okinawa, along with related past works.
About the artists
Fujii Hikaru
Born in Tokyo in 1976. Lives and works in Tokyo. Graduated with a DEA (MA) from Université de Paris 8 in 2004. Fujii Hikaru’s practice is based on the notion that artistic production implies a close relationship with society and history. Mainly in the form of video installation, he creates work that responds to contemporary social issues through detailed research and fieldwork on unique cultures and histories of various countries and regions. Fujii organizes workshops—intersections for interdisciplinary and artistic collaboration between specialists from diverse various fields. Here he reenacts historical events with participants as well as generates a situation where an active discussion arises. His methodology links the present with the past in creative ways, while structurally critiquing the domains of history and society that remain invisible.
Yamashiro Chikako
Born in Okinawa in 1976. Exploring marginalized voice, body and soul in East Asia region, Yamashiro Chikako’s works have addressed the subject of identity, border between life and death and metabolism of historical memory. The geopolitical situation and history of Okinawa, where she was born and raised, have given strong motivation and parameters in her artistic practice. She has attempted to deliver overheard/looked voices and body of oppressed people and soul and to find the way of reconciliation between nature and human, and self and the other through her poetic image and narrative. She has used photography and video for works using her body and other people’s bodies because she believes that they can fuse the border between reality and imagination as well as generate multiple meanings between the image and the audience. Experimenting with different filmmaking techniques, such as recycling of found footages, employing voice performance and using multi-channel screens, she continuously challenges to develop potential of moving image and its performability.
About the monographs
In conjunction with the opening of the exhibition, a monograph (in Japanese and English) is published for each artist that includes images of their works in addition to the artist’s own texts about their work and creative process, and contributions from experts. The PDF files will be published on TCAA website around the end of March 2022. The monographs are not for sale.
Organizers: Tokyo Metropolitan Government and Tokyo Arts and Space / Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo of the Tokyo Metropolitan Foundation for History and Culture
