August 30, 2016

BODY/PLAY/POLITICS
Venue:Dates:

Yokohama Museum of Art
October 1 (Sat ) - December 14 (Wed ), 2016

The Yokohama Museum of Art is proud to present BODY/PLAY/POLITICS from Saturday,
October 1 to Wednesday, December 14, 2016.
BODY/PLAY/POLITICS presents contemporary works of art that delve from a variety of angles
into images that have been generated throughout history by “the body,” which encompasses the individual
human body, our collective actions, and spiritual presences. There is a tendency in our society to label
specific bodies as healthy or unhealthy, beautiful or ugly, and to envision certain modes of behavior as
representative of the entire group, which we classify such as “typically Japanese.” In other cases, minor
deviations from norms or expectations can elicit strange feelings in observers and cause entirely different
meanings to be perceived.
In a world cohabited by people with all sorts of skin colors, ethnicities, religions, gender norms
and lifestyles, where the colors, forms, or behaviors of individual bodies are not inherently vested withspecific meanings, over the course of millennia many value judgments and hierarchies have arisen insocieties and are all too often linked to tragedies of history.
The six artists featured in this exhibition are from Europe/ Africa, Southeast Asia, and Japan.
Their works express, in poetic and sometimes humor-inflected ways, aspects of history that manifest
themselves through the body, looking toward the future and bringing the shapes of new ideas and meanings
into view.

Artists▊Yinka Shonibare MBE
Born 1962 in London, UK. Lives and works in London.
Shonibare was born in London and moved to Lagos, Nigeria at the age ofthree. He returned to London to study Fine Art, first at Byam Shaw School of
Art (now Central Saint Martins College) and then at Goldsmiths, where hereceived his MFA.
Shonibare's work explores issues of race, class and colonialism through themedia of painting, sculpture, photography and film. His trademark material is
the brightly coloured 'African' batik fabric he buys in London. This type of©James Mollison 2014
fabric was inspired by Indonesian design, mass-produced by the Dutch andfinally sold to the colonies in West Africa. It has become a sign of African identity and independence.
In this exhibition, in addition to the sculptural works, Shonibare presents a film piece in which a female singerlaments. She is wearing a 19th century French-style dress made of Dutch wax printed cotton textile. She plays therole of Violetta who is a heroine of the opera La Traviata by Verdi, and sings the aria “Addio del passato.”▊Yee I-Lann
Born 1971 in Sabah, Malaysia. Lives and works in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
Yee I-Lann creates photographic, video, and installation works that explore
issues of culture, power and the role of historical memory in contemporarysocial experiences. In this show, she exhibits a video installation inspired by thenotorious Pontianak, a prominent female ghost figure in South East Asianfolklore. Typically depicted as a woman monster in white robes with long
disheveled black hair, she is also known as Kuntilanak in Indonesia, Nang Taniin Thailand and Cambodia, and the foetus and child-eating Aswang in thePhilippines. In different legends, she is the spirit of a woman who died duringchildbirth; or because she was raped; or she exists to address the wrong thatmen commit against the female sex. She serves to strike fear in the hearts of©Joe Kidd
men and as such often cuts an abject figure, and is a favourite subject of horror movies. Yee I-Lann proposes
Pontianak can be reclaimed as a figure of female agency and revives her as a symbol of the voiceless female
experience through contemporary young women. Imagining Pontianak: I’ve Got Sunshine On A Cloudy Day seeks
to elicit opinions on womanhood and childbirth-related pressures and broader social conditions in South East Asia
from these women’s perspectives.

▊Apichatpong Weerasethakul
Born 1970 in Bangkok, Thailand. Living and working in Chiang Mai.
Brought up in Khon Kaen, northeastern Thailand, Weerasethakul has dealt
with the political complexities of the region poetically and symbolically in hisfilms and videos. In 2010, his film Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past
Lives (2010) won Palme d’Or in Cannes Film Festival. His latest, Cemetery ofSplendour (2015), has been screening all over Japan this year.
This exhibition features the Japanese premiere of his 2016 video installation
Fireworks (Fans), the latest installment in his Fireworks series, which wasphotograph by Chai Siris
begun in 2014. It is his first installation in the city of Yokohama since the Yokohama Triennale in 2011.

▊UuDam Tran Nguyen
Born in 1971 in Kon Tum, Vietnam. Lives and works in Ho Chi Minh.
UuDam studied art in Vietnam and the United States. Throughout his years inboth countries, he has created movement-oriented works including
video-based performances, sculptures, and interactive projects such as adrawing machine remotely controlled over the Internet. In this exhibition, hepresents a 3 channel video installation, Serpents’ Tails. In that motorcycles,
which rule the roads of Vietnam, circulate freely around the old city of Ho Chi
Minh like blood cells circulating throughout a body. They pass endlessbuildings crowded together, ranging from remnants of the French colonial era to modern architecture built during
Ho Chi Minh City’s rapid development making it the Socialist Republic of Vietnam’s main commercial city afterunification. The city itself comes to resemble a giant creature harboring a complex history and tenacious life force.

▊Ishikawa Ryuichi
Born in 1984 in Ginowan, Okinawa. Lives and works in Ginowan, Okinawa, Japan.
Only 10 years after picking up his first camera, Ishikawa has already made a powerful
impact on the world of photography, including winning both the Kimura Ihei Award andthe Photographic Society of Japan Newcomer's Award in 2015, with his breathlessly
tension-filled images of the scenery and people of Okinawa where he lives. In thisexhibition, he presents for the first time photographic portraits and landscapes taken
both in Okinawa and in other places, as well as a new series that continuously follows acertain two people over several years.
Ishikawa’s photographs show us a new side of the Japan we thought we knew, and theraw, diverse realities of Okinawa far removed from its conventional image. The artist
directs his distinctly affectionate gaze at people who strive, however awkwardly at times,
to live life to the fullest, compellingly showing us the value of human lives which cannot
be measured by any uniform scale.

▊Tamura Yuichiro
Born in 1977 in Toyama, Japan. Lives and works in Atami, Japan.
Working in a wide range of media including video, photography, installation andperformance, Tamura delves into the memory and history of localities andtransforms these into new narratives that transcend time and space, presenting
works that investigate the contemporary significance of past events. This
exhibition features his new video installation focusing on the history of modernbodybuilding. Originating in Prussia in the 19th century, modern bodybuilding
soon spread from Europe to America and thence to Japan via Yokohama underpost-World War II Allied occupation, creating a new image of the body for themodern era. This work delivers a new, unknown story of postwar Yokohama via
a new dramatic piece narrated by a fictional storyteller reminiscent of Mishima
Yukio, and also incorporates a collaboration with Tada Junnosuke, a participant in this exhibition’s partner project
Yokohama Dance Collection 2017.

Yinka Shonibare MBE,Addio del Passato, 2011
Courtesy the artist and James Cohan Gallery,
New York

Yee I-Lann,
Santai, 2016
©Yee I-Lann

Apichatpong Weerasethakul,
Fireworks (Fans), 2016
Courtesy of Apichatpong Weerasethakul

UuDam Tran Nguyen,
From Serpents’ Tails, 2015
© UuDam Tran Nguyen. Courtesy of the artist.

Ishikawa
Ryuichi,.
Urasoe, The Hand of Guppy, 2012
©Ryuichi Ishikawa

Tamura Yuichiro,From Milky Bay, 2016）

Event *Language: English/ Japanese

1．Artist TalkArtists

UuDam Tran Nguyen, Apichatpong Weerasethakul

Date and Time

October 1 (Sat.), 2016 13:45-16:30 (Doors open 13:15)

Venue

Circular Forum at Yokohama Museum of Art

Capacity

100

AdmissionFree

2．Asia Art Week Forum
Date and Time

Ripples - Art in Japan, Malaysia, Indonesia in the 20th Century

October 2 (Sun.), 2016[Session 1] 13:00-16:00 (Doors open 12:30)[Session 2] 17:30-20:30 (Doors open 17:00)

Venue[Session 1] Circular Forum at Yokohama Museum of Art[Session 2] Site-D Beneath the Railways (1-2, Koganecho, Naka-ku, Yokohama)

Capacity

100 for each venue

Admission

FreeTime Table[Session 1]
13:00-14:00

Keynote Speech
1868-1945: Change of the Body View in Japan During the Modern
Period [from the End of Edo period until WW2]
Kawata Akihisa [Art Historian, Professor, Chiba Institute of Technology]

14:00-16:00

Breakout Session 1Feminism Movement in Malaysia and Indonesia after 1950s－from Artists’ Point of View
Panelists:

Yee I-Lann [Artist]
Kokatsu Reiko[Art Historian and Critique of Modern and Contemporary Art]

Moderator:

Kimura Eriko [Curator, Yokohama Museum of Art]

[Session 2]
17:30-19:30

Breakout Session 2
Ono Saseo and the Art in Indonesia in 1940s

Panelists:

Antariksa [Historian, co-founder of KUNCI Cultural Studies Center]
Ono Kosei[Chairman, Japan Society for Studies in Cartoons and Comics]

Moderator:

Yamano Shingo [Director, Koganecho Bazaar]

19:30-20:30

Discussion by panelists

Organized by

The City of Yokohama, Yokohama Museum of Art

Project management:

Koganecho Area Management Center3．Live Performance
YASEIHA: Third accident of the great curry (I cannot hear you without wifi)
Performer

YASEIHA [Ishikawa Ryuichi + Yoshihama Syo+ Miyagi Futoshi + Watanabe Go+ Reuben Keehan + Kimura Eriko]

Date and Time

October 28 (Fri.), 2016 19:00-20:30

Venue

Grand Gallery at Yokohama Museum of Art

AdmissionFree

Co-organized by Yokohama Otomatsuri 2016

Partner Project
Yokohama Dance Collection 2017 “BODY/PLAY/POLITICS”
Dates

January 26, Thursday -February 19, Sunday, 2017

Venue

Yokohama Red Brick Warehouse No.1
Yokohama Nigiwai-za Small Hall

Artists

Damien Jalet, Nawa Kohei, Tada Junnosuke,
Eisa Jocson, etc.

For inquiries

Yokohama Red Brick Warehouse No.1
Tel: ＋81（0）45-211-1515
http://www.yokohama-dance-collection-r.jp/en/

Damien Jalet｜Nawa Kohei
VESSELAdmission
Adults¥1,500 ( 1,300/ 1,400)

University and high school students¥1,000 (800/900)

Junior high school students¥ 600 (400/500)

Children under 12Free

Seniors (65 and Older)¥1,400 *ID required.

Only available at ticket counter in the museum.

*()＝Advance/Group of 20 or more.
*Advance tickets are available at the Museum Shop from September 1 through September 30, 2016.
*Free admission on November 3, 2016.
*For a group of 20 or more, reservation is required in advance.
*Free admission for high school students and younger with valid IDs on Saturdays.
*Visitors with disability and one person accompanying them are admitted free of charge.
(Please present certificate at the entrance.)*The ticket also gives admission to the Exhibition of the Museum Collection for the same day.

General Information
Title:

BODY/PLAY/POLITICS

Dates:

October 1 (Sat.)-December 14 (Wed.), 2016

Open hours:

10:00-18:00 (Last admission at 17:30)* Open until 20:30 on October 28 (Fri.), 2016 (Last admission at 20:00)

Closed:Thursdays (except November 3), November 4 (Fri.)

Venue:

Yokohama Museum of Art
3-4-1, Minatomirai, Nishi-ku, Yokohama 220-0012
TEL:+81(0)45 221 0300 FAX:+81(0)45 221 0317
URL: http://yokohama.art.museum/eng

Curator:Kimura Eriko

Co-Curators:

Matsunaga Shintaro, Katada Yuko, Hibino Miyon

Organized by:
Grant from:Special Sponsored by:
Supported by:
In Cooperation with:
Project Partner:Yokohama Museum of Art [Yokohama Arts Foundation]
Japan Arts FundWarehouse TERRADA
The City of Yokohama
Yokohama Minatomirai Railway Company, Yokohama Cable Visio Inc.,
Yokohama FM Broadcasting Co., Ltd., Metropolitan Expressway Co., Ltd.
Yokohama Red Brick Warehouse No.1［Yokohama Arts Foundation］

Contact
Ms. Miyano, Ms. Fujii, Ms. Nagahama
Public Relations, Yokohama Museum of Art
3-4-1, Minatomirai, Nishi-ku, Yokohama. 220-0012 JAPAN
TEL:+81(0)45 221 0319

FAX:+81(0)45 221 0317

E-mail: pr-yma@yaf.or.jp