Aki Sasamoto
Point Reflection
12.06.23 – 04.07.24
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Aki Sasamoto
Point Reflection
Aki Sasamoto: Point Reflection presents a selectionof recent works and premieres a new performanceby New York-based artist Aki Sasamoto. A uniquesynthesis of visual art and theatrical performance,
Sasamoto’s work engages the banal and universal
in human behavior through her kinetic installationand eccentric acts and monologues.
Sasamoto’s practice revolves around the idea ofchanges and phases, predictability andunpredictability in life with wide ranging topics
including cravings, laundry, romance, and aging.
The exhibition title “point reflection” refers to aflipped mirror image of a condition in geometry, anda reflection point is the mirror point on the opposite
side of the axis. This exhibition includes works inwhich these abstract concepts are “performed” byanimated objects serving as stand-ins for the artist:
groups of snail shells or whisky tumblers that areair-driven into a frantic spinning motion. Sasamoto
meticulously produces and choreographs physicalelements and their movements in her installations,weaving layers of meaning through scientific, visual,and linguistic wordplay: what are the connections
between the counterclockwise coiling of snail shells
and left-handed boxers?; how does a weeklong
tornado forecast mirror the ailments in a humanbody and mind?
With her fascination in evolutionary biology andmeteorology, Sasamoto’s work acts as anexperimental system of improvisation and repetition.
Here, the unsuspected normalities in everyday life
undergo rigorous testing giving rise to unlikely
metaphors and associations in a structured chaos
where familiar turns unfamiliar, and vice versa.

Aki Sasamoto: Point Reflection is organized byHitomi Iwasaki, Head of Exhibitions / Curator. Theinstallation and the performance Point Reflection areproduced in collaboration with Alsarah, Madeline
Best, Matt Bauder, and Ben Hagari. The exhibition is
produced in cooperation with the Queens Museum
team: Brian Balderston, Lindsey Berfond, Hayley
Blackstone, Sarah Cho, Gianina Enriquez, Catherine
Grau, Mayisha Hassan, Lauren Haynes, Adrianne
Koteen, Amari-Grey Johnson, Lynn Maliszewski,Gabriela Peralta, Aaron Strauss, Heryte T. Tequame,Tiffany Tong, and Maria Fernanda Zambrano;
Queens Museum fabricators and preparators: MaxBell, Noemi Bilger, Jackson Denahy, Mark Dwinell,
Magnus Gitt Henderson, Brittany Hayden, TalyKornblum Laudi, Clare Koury, Martin Kramer, Ajay
Kurian, Samantha Lasko, Juyon Lee, Erik Nilson,
Jetaime Nkiru, Mallie Sanford, and Claude Viaud
Peralta; and Eco Management LLC: Max Bell, Sam
Branden, Dilan Cheavacci, Mark Power, and Chad
Stayrook.

Aki Sasamoto wishes to thank her collaborators, aswell as ongoing support from Bortolami, New York,and Take Ninagawa, Tokyo. Special thanks to Soyka
Sheetmetal and UrbanGlass.
An audio description narrated by Sarah Cho,Assistant Curator, can be found on the Queens
Museum Digital Guide, available for free on theBloomberg Connects App.

Aki Sasamotob. Kanagawa, Japan, 1980
Sink or Float, 2022
Mixed media installation including snail shell, sugar
packet, sponge, feather, plastic wall-hook, coffee
cup lid, magnifier, altered industrial kitchen sink andappliance with LED light, HVAC duct, centrifugal
fan, and illustrated whiteboard
Courtesy of the artist and Bortolami, New York, andTake Ninagawa, Tokyo
Sasamoto adapted the airflow mechanism to “float”
assorted everyday objects—some are sculpturally
altered—inside the kitchen “sinks,” setting them off
to the chaotic whirl of spinning and gliding. Theseobjects including snail shells (some with feathers
attached to reverse their spinning direction), cubed
sponges, plastic hooks, coffee cup lids, and sugar
packets are grouped variously among the sinks.
Fluctuating between collective and individual,
predictable and unpredictable, their movementdeviates from scientific predictions. They scatter
onto the whiteboards to join the marker drawings
and scripts, as well as the inside of the refrigerator
and the rotisserie oven bathed in colored LED light.
Mysterious and playful at once, the objects inmotion prompt analogies and analysis that extend
beyond their unexpected universe in the commercial
kitchen setting.
Bloomberg Connects Number:101
https://app.bloombergconnects.org/IiPvJpQDjFb

Aki Sasamotob. Kanagawa, Japan, 1980
Point Reflection, 2023
Performance/Installation
HDPE plastic, wood, blowers, hardware, LED lights,
electronics, ducts, and various objects
Lighting Design: Madeline Best
Original Music: Alsarah and Matt BauderCourtesy of the artist and Bortolami, New York, andTake Ninagawa, Tokyo
Point Reflection (Video), 2023
Single channel video with soundVideo Soundtrack: Matt Bauder
Cinematography: Ben Hagari
Courtesy of the artist and Bortolami, New York, andTake Ninagawa, Tokyo
Bloomberg Connects Number:102, 103
https://app.bloombergconnects.org/IiPvJpQDjFb

Aki Sasamotob. Kanagawa, Japan, 1980
Past in a future tense, 2019
Past in a future tense, Bar end: hand-blown glass,whiskey glass, HVAC duct, electric fan, speedcontrol, red oak, foot rail, coat hook, umbrella; Pastin a future tense, Table 1 and Past in a future tense,
Table 2: hand-blown glass, whiskey glass, HVAC
duct, centrifugal fan, speed control, red oak, andiron table base
Courtesy of the artist and Bortolami, New York, andTake Ninagawa, Tokyo
Sasamoto puts an unexpected twist on subjects
that she pulls from her everyday life such as
breakups, doing laundry, and craving. In thisbar-style installation, a shot of air is served as a“drink” that puts a whiskey glass into spinningmotion. The artist learned the unpredictable laws
governing this air-driven mechanism while skillfully
crafting and calibrating these glass sculptures toperform the spinning. The rapid spinning can slow
to a complete stillness, only to resume spinningwithout a discernible pattern of the cycle, as if
echoing the complex tension between the desire forcontrol (both of science and of humans) and theuntamable human nature.
Bloomberg Connects Number:
201
https://app.bloombergconnects.org/IiPvJpQDjFb

Aki Sasamotob. Kanagawa, Japan, 1980
Weather Bar #1, 2019
Single channel video with sound
4 min 47 sec
Weather Bar #2, 2019
Single channel video with sound3 min 35 sec
Courtesy of the artist and Bortolami, New York, andTake Ninagawa, Tokyo
Weather Bar #1 and #2 feature TV monitors thatshowcase weather forecasts performed bySasamoto at a bar counter. While demonstrating theweather conditions in a manner that is a crossbetween that of a bartender and a high-school
science teacher, the artist translates planet-wide
extreme weather events into a “local” one, adisastrous gastronomic turmoil inside a humanbody. In these videos, she methodicallydemonstrates a week-long daily tornado warningwith a countertop vortex of fire.
Sasamoto’s forecast performance is a cross-sectionof meteorology, health consultation, andfortune-telling. It serves as a satirical metaphor forthe recent extraordinary world events and climatechanges, as well as sudden shifts and treacherous
transitions in life that often assert themselves
independent of human control.
Bloomberg Connects Number:
202, 203https://app.bloombergconnects.org/IiPvJpQDjFb