WATARU KOYAMA
Selection Works
2024

CVWATARU KOYAMA
1992

Born in Tokyo

2016

BFA, Tokyo Zokei University

Solo show
2023”Snap out of it” (Art Center Ongoing, Tokyo)

2021”The Heart is Beating” (Decameron, Tokyo)

2019”Untouchable” (Kitasenju BUoY, Tokyo)

Group, duo show
2023

”facetoface.controlnet (SITUASIAN vol.2)” (LANLANLI ＆ ONEPIECE GALLERY, Xiamen City, China)

2023”Creative Thinking 1: A Modern Touch” (Tokyo Zokei University Affiliated Art Museum, Tokyo)

2023”Himemoto Takeshi Contemporary Art Collection Vol. 4 Everything Everywhere All Alive” (Susakimachikado Gallery, etc, Kochi)

2023”Mitsubishi Corporation Art Gate Program 2021-2022: New Works by 6 Supporting Artists” (Daikanyama Hillside Forum, Tokyo)

2022”GUMYOJI OPEN STUDIO 2022 AUTUMN”（Meiro Koizumi Studio, Kanagawa）

2022”WVlog:personal”（Art Center Ongoing, Tokyo）

2022”Sumikko CRASH ☆ ”（MUJIN-TO Production, Tokyo）

2021”ALTERNATIVE KYOTO” (Various locations in Yagi Town, Nantan City, Kyoto)

2020”1GB” (SPIRAL Hall Foyer, Tokyo)

2018”Escape” (Art Center Ongoing, Tokyo)

2016“SUPER OPEN STUDIO 2016” (Aihara Studio, Tokyo）

2015“Studio Exhibition 2015 summer “ （Satoshi Ohno Studio, Yamanashi)

Performance
2019”Circus, festival” (blan Class, Kanagawa)2019”Phantasma” (blan Class, Kanagawa)

2018”Regional consideration to travel - Summer version inspired by Akita” (Gojome Town, Akita)

2018”Spectacular inter-forest school” Theater Commons Lab, (SHIBAURA HOUSE, Tokyo)

Screening
2019”RAM PRACTICE -Thoughts on Post Documentary” (Shibuya EURO LIVE, Tokyo)

Exhibitions Planning
2023”EDITION BOX Ⅱ -body of concept-” (Geidai Art Plaza, Tokyo)

2020”EDITION BOX -VIDEO WORKS as MATERIAL-” (HIGURE 17-15 cas, Tokyo)

2019”Display of works #2 -VIDEO EDITION BOX-” (Art Center Ongoing, Tokyo)

2018”Display of works #1 (SUPER OPEN STUDIO 2018)” (Aihara Studio, Tokyo）

Artist in residence
2020”Kyoto: Re-Search in Nantan” (Nantan City, Kyoto）

Fellowship2021-2022”Mitsubishi Corporation ART GATE Program 2021 - 2022 / Category: Breakthrough”

Statement

Field: “Innermost Narrative”
I have a consistent interest in the human mind, focusing on themes such as emotions, psychopathology,
the boundaries between normalcy and abnormality, and views on life and death. My work mainly
involves creating video pieces. Recently, I have been exploring expressions that emerge from theintimate relationships developed over time between the artist and the subject.
The basis of my work is largely influenced by my experiences as a socially withdrawn adolescent and asa staff in a psychiatric welfare facility. These experiences have profoundly influenced my observations
and imaginations about the human inner world, the process of dialogue with others, and how individuals
confront and live with the oppression and norms imposed by society.
Humans can smile while actually being sad or cry out of joy. Loud voices must be simple, but with a softvoice, one can maintain a complex and ironic attitude. In my video works, it will be an experience oflistening closely to the quiet voices of individuals.
What I expect from artistic expression as I gaze into the human mind is to shake the boundaries ofvarious human values.

CRPPP -Comprehensive Repression Prevention and Protection
Programme-2023, video installation, 33 min 06 sec

This is a video that captures the process of collaborating with a woman who is both a person with a mental illness and a
psychiatric nurse, as we discuss her “things she wants to try” and bring them to life.
She tells me, an artist, that “artists are skilled at playing in society’s miniature garden, but I want to break that “miniature garden.”
While I cannot eliminate all the oppression she experiences from her “miniature garden,” I decided to explore ways to look down
on her miniature garden together and play without breaking it.
The title “CRPPP” is a twist on the program “CVPPP” primarily used in the psychiatric healthcare field. It was developed as aprogram to intervene appropriately in violence and aggression caused by patients’ symptoms while protecting their dignity andensuring safety for both patients and healthcare providers. The original program, “CVPPP” (Comprehensive Violence Prevention
and Protection Programme), has “Violence” replaced with “Repression,” representing psychological repression.

The Heart is Beating2021-2022, video installation, 38 min 22 sec

I was listening to a psychiatrist friend talk about the death of a person with schizophrenia. As we delved deeper, he mentionedthat his own sister, who may have had schizophrenia, also died in a river several years ago. I could see glimpses of his dual
perspectives: thinking about schizophrenia as a doctor and feeling about it as a family member. So, I suggested he write a letterand a medical chart about his sister.
This work was created through a series of dialogues between us, starting from the words his sister spoke just before she passed
away: “My heart is beating.” Narratives about mental illness and death often emphasize the tragic and sorrowful aspects. Hesays, “I cannot agree with simple sadness.” Indeed, we may often understand many events in our daily lives too simplistically.
He continues to think about questions that have no answers.
In his letter, he said, “I finally realized that I don’t have to make a sad, crying face when I am sad, or a happy face when I amhappy.”Snap out of it2020 - 2023, video installation, 16 min 37 sec

I came across a description in a document about pre war hydrotherapy (douche treatment) that said, “Mental illness is caused
by a boiling head, so cool the head with water,” and it left a strong impression on me. Using those words as a starting point, I
discussed sanity with a friend who has a mental illness.
Hydrotherapy for mental illness is recognized as an effective treatment method with modern theories and facilities. However,looking back in history, there are records of similar primitive practices worldwide, based on the idea of “cooling the head withwater.” This image of old “hydrotherapy” also resonates with the torturous process of “waterboarding,” where confessions andthoughts are corrected.
In the absurd dialogue attempting to prove sanity or madness, we keep shouting, “Are you sane?” and “I am sane.”(This work is vastly different from the hydrotherapy currently practiced.)

Last minute2020 - , video installation, 1 min (The 1 minute recorded video will continue until I die.)This work is a video piece where, within a one-minute time limit, I irregularly record the “last words” (testament) that I want toleave at that moment when I feel the need to preserve memories and emotions. It’s a lifelong project, and I intend to continue
recording until I die.
I plan to play this video at my funeral. Additionally, intentional audio deletions are made in the footage, as it contains content thatcannot be disclosed during my lifetime.
One minute is too short and tasteless as a final message. At the end of a human life, despite wanting to preserve everythingimportant, it’s impossible. Even if something important can be preserved, other important things will be left out. I want to resist
this dilemma of the last words, even if just a little.
This project began when a friend passed away, but sadly, over the years of recording, there have been more and more close
people who passed away at a young age. Lately, every time I film this project, it becomes a time to remember them. For me, thisproject makes me realize something until the end of my life.

Imagination of Killing
2023, single channel video, 10 min 26 sec

I consult with “him (AI program)”, who abides by the norms and ethics of killing.

More Light?
2021, sound installation, 25 min 55 sec

A schizophrenic who says, “When I’m on medication, I’m not really me.” A narration of a schizophrenic’s bi-polar daily life. This isa sound installation where you listen to audio through headphones while
receiving light in front of your eyes.
She fits in with the normal person by performing the social roles that are given to her from the outside, but searches for aplace to express the energy that boils up inside, craving freedom and liberation, but the moment she acts on it, she becomes aproblem. The dilemma of suppressing one’s own identity and being known as an invalid because one is fully aware of the eyesof one’s partner and one’s doctor is blurred in the narration.

Cloudy Heart
2021, sound installation, loop sound.

Inside the acrylic box, hermetically sealed smoke drifts, and the sound pressure of a beating heart causes an invisible heart tobeat in the fog.
I was told that one psychiatrist sometimes uses the term “fogging. It describes the use of medication to moderately cloud the realworld, which is too painful for a schizophrenic to see and feel.
In contrast, they say, “sunny” refers to the state of being exposed to the bare real world without the use of medication. I interpret“clouded” to mean a state of adaptation to this rational society, but many people are not “clear” and I feel that they, including
myself, live by “clouding” themselves to some degree.

Fire Dialogue (#1 - #16)
2021, lambda print、203×254mm (Variable size)

The motivation for this work is that I began to think about life and death as the fear of death, which cannot be seen and is vague,is spreading throughout the world in the form of a virus.
I put a cigarette in my mouth and ask you to share the light of your lit cigarette. Cigarettes are lit when we inhale, so it is difficult
to light a cigarette if our breathing motions do not match. Breathing is not something we are usually conscious of in our daily
lives, but there may be moments when we are consciously aware of our own breathing, such as when we are concentratingon sports or work, or when we have a physical ailment. However, I don’t think we have many opportunities to be aware of thebreathing of others.
In this act of sharing the light of a cigarette, you will first be aware of your relationship to it, which is caused by the close distancebetween you. While I wait for you to light the cigarette with your lighter, I can observe your face, unmasked, for the first time in along time. Then we will rub the cigarettes together and become aware of each other’s breathing.
In that moment when our breaths meet and the cigarettes are lit, I feel as if I can confirm our tiny lives.

Society is Community of Dream
2019, video installation, 16 min 26 sec

In this works, a friend with a mental illness is asked to talk about his experience with auditory hallucinations. “He” starts talking
about how he “heard an auditory hallucination from a speaker in a convenience store. Then, a dialogue takes place between “he”
and myself, with “he” and I giving shape to the images that emerge from the content of the conversation, each time using ourhands to shape the clay.
Our voices echo through the speakers in the space. However, at “his” wish, “his” figure is removed and his voice is overwritten
by noisy electronic sounds. As a result, only my own words are heard in space.
As a result, only my own words echo in the space, and the viewer is forced to look into the subtitles of the video projected on thebox garden in order to read “his” voice.
The installation is not a dialogue, but rather a monologue of my own. The dialogue between the “invisible he” and myself was as
if I myself (the viewer) were listening to an auditory hallucination.
(This work is based on the psychotherapeutic technique called “box garden therapy”).

I tried to forget but I can’t remember
2018, video installation

In the famous Japanese gag cartoonist Fujio Akatsuka’s masterpiece “The Genius Bakabon,” Bakabon’s father says the contradictoryline, “I can’t remember even if I try to forget”.
In this video work, the phrase is thrown to various people and they are asked to tell stories related to “I can’t remember even if I try toforget”. After the story is told, the paper is torn into small pieces, and the torn pieces are wrapped and rolled up like cigarettes to formcigarettes. Finally, the participants are asked to smoke a cigarette that they “I can’t remember even if I try to forget”.
The words “I can’t remember even if I try to forget” seem contradictory, yet somehow essential. I imagine that those who haveexperienced extraordinary disasters or wars may also have traumas that are recalled by such contradictory words. However, even in
the most mundane, everyday experiences, there are events that the individual still cannot sort out his or her memories and feelings.
This work may be a time for “introspection,” looking back on “things I still don’t understand” in a light-hearted manner. I may not be able
to put it into words well this time either.
I sometimes roll my own cigarettes, and I feel that the time spent rolling is a time of “introspection,” but when I have finished smoking,that heavy “introspection” seems to lighten like smoke and gradually disappear, which was the motivation for this work.