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Chim↑Pom: So see you again tomorrow, too?

>> HISTORY & THEORY>> print>> THINK
This piece is included in Ran Dian’s print magazine,
issue 5 (Spring 2017)
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DATE
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EX: 1/30/2012
KEYWORD“Has the decision to host the Olympics not yet been
made? Why is it that we dare not do such a thing?”—Deng Xiaoping, 1990
Can we still remember the time when Beijing was
bidding for the Olympics in 2000, when the grass in
the Xidan area was sprayed green? The new
Maquanying and Fourth Ring subway lines had
opened, and construction had just begun on the ﬁfth
ring road; from 1998 to 2007, Beijing’s investment incleaning up environmental pollution amounted to 12
billion US dollars. The beneﬁts of such an effort,
however, do not extend into the present day, whenpollution by 2.5 particulate matter persists in the city.

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NEWSLETTER
enter your email>> Conﬁrm subscribe“Having built sports facilities like this [the National
Olympics Sports Center], if we don’t end up hosting
the Olympics, it would be half wasted.” (Deng
Xiaoping) The rebuilding of the National Sports
Center was not only a practical measure taken to
boost athletes’ morale, it also meant thetransformation of a popular sports event into a
political event in which the nation’s will was
unconditionally implemented, and the violent threat of authority widely felt.

See all photos (13)Similarly, in Tokyo, harnessing the momentum of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics combined with theannouncement of “anti-earthquake procedures” after Fukushima’s 3.11 earthquake, the government
issued and enforced a series of urban redevelopment projects. In addition to Shinjuku Station, Shibuya
Station, and Shibuya’s PARCO department store, even the historical and trendy Harajuku Station isundergoing restoration. Correspondingly, Kabukichō is pushing forward reconstruction plans for theentire district.
Faced with such changing landscapes, the Tokyo art collective Chim↑Pom asks: why is it that we
prioritize the so-called “Olympics”? Locals (including Fukushima locals) have expressed concern that,since Tokyo’s urgent building projects are causing a shortage in construction workers, reconstruction
after the 3.11 disaster has come to a standstill. Furthermore, the Japanese Government has beencalling for international public opinion to rethink the meaning of the Olympics, calling it “The Recovery
Olympics”, and connecting it back to the 1964 Tokyo Olympics. After all, it was precisely those
Olympics in ’64 that helped Tokyo rise up from the ashes of post-war ruin; aided by the Olympian
vision, Tokyo gradually developed into an international metropolitan city, from infrastructure-building to
the renewal of its zeitgeist. While the will of the nation can only be expressed by competition withother countries, it is also constrained by all kinds of internal tension, which originates from efforts that
accord the nation with ﬁxed historical forms.
But what is recovery? What is urban revitalization?

制版本2》，2016（版权：Chim↑Pom；鸣谢：艺术家和东京MUJINTO

Chim↑Pom，《蓝图绘影Production；摄 ：KENJI MORITA）/ Chim↑Pom, “Drawing a blueprint version 2”, 2016 (©
Chim↑Pom; courtesy of the artist and MUJINTO Production; Tokyo, photo by KENJI MORITA)

制版本2》，2016（版权：Chim↑Pom；鸣谢：艺术家和东京MUJINTO

Chim↑Pom，《蓝图绘影Production；摄 ：KENJI MORITA）/ Chim↑Pom, “Drawing a blueprint version 2”, 2016 (©
Chim↑Pom; courtesy of the artist and MUJINTO Production; Tokyo, photo by KENJI MORITA)

制版本

版权

家和 京

Chim↑Pom，《蓝图绘2》，2016（：Chim↑Pom；鸣谢：艺术东 MUJINTO
Production；摄 ：KENJI MORITA）/ Chim↑Pom, “Drawing a blueprint version 2”, 2016 (©

影

Chim↑Pom; courtesy of the artist and MUJINTO Production; Tokyo, photo by KENJI MORITA)
Using scraps to reconstruct the future?
Chim↑Pom’s new project “So see you again tomorrow, too?” is located in the Kabukichō Promotion
Association Building, which, once a part of the Commercial Street Revitalization Union project in 1964,
cost 15 million Japanese Yen to complete. 52 years later, as part of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics“Revitalization Project”, this building will be demolished in October. Living in a constantly ﬂuctuatingurban landscape, the Japanese have come to accept the proposition posed by these buildings andtheir fate. In Chim↑Pom’s opinion, historically speaking, Japanese people have acquired an aptitude
for adopting a “Scrap and Build” logic and method through their many confrontations withcatastrophe. But does the future of the 21st century necessarily entail the re-deployment of 20th
century vision? “Using “Scrap and Build” as the theme of the exhibition, we will create a kind ofexperience that questions the ‘method of making blue-prints’.”
Works made using cyanotypes can be found throughout the building. In addition to being used inphotography and the reproduction of architectural drawings, cyanotypes (or “blueprints”) can mean
hope or new prospects when referred to in literature. Interested in this intersection between craft andhope or new prospects when referred to in literature. Interested in this intersection between craft andmeaning, Chim↑Pom created “Drawing a Blueprint Version 2″ on the fourth ﬂoor using cyanotypes—atechnique gradually becoming obsolete in 21st century architectural design—to render a 20th century
urban landscape that is slowly disappearing in the 21st century. What kind of sentiment does thiscombination conjure up: revitalization, progress, or regret? Likewise, in “Drawing Mirai”, a work on thesecond ﬂoor, Chim↑Pom uses cyanotypes to trace the outline of a sex worker. Calling herself “Mirai”,
this 18-year old appears in Kabukichō, a district characterized by the sex industry, marginal groups,
and entertainment culture, as well as hipster styles. Like any girl from Ichibangai Street, Mirai is afeature of this dazzlingly grotesque area—it is precisely owing to the lives that enliven these streetsthat Kabukichō can be said to bear witness to diverse ways of living, multifarious world views, and an
unforeseeable future.
For “Libido-Electricity Conversion Machine”, Chim↑Pom released small advertisements containing
telephone numbers on multiple media platforms, disguising themselves as a telephone sex service.
The idea is that the “sex drives” generated by this work can be converted into electricity, a substituteenergy for coal, oil, and natural gases: when a customer’s call is received, this device would “connect
with” desire—radio waves are converted into electrical power via the relay’s optical sensors in order tokeep the work running. In Kabukichō’s Ichibangai Street ﬂow countless desires. In Shinjuku Swan, aﬁlm directed by Sion Sono in 2015, a group of “talent agents” seek out girls on the streets, luring theminto the porn industry: “We want them to be happy, then use them to make money” was their motto. In
Kabukichō, it is suggested that there is the potential for a mutual exchange of happiness and capital.
Whether on screen or in real-life, it is, as the movie trailer says, “a place to dream”.
Kabukichō’s urban planning chief Hideaki Ishikawa once said: “Tokyo is too big. To a certain extent, it
is lacking in spirituality.” Taking a dislike to big cities, Ishikawa stressed the importance ofconsumption over urban expansion and production, emphasizing in particular the development of theentertainment industry. As the ofﬁcer in charge of Tokyo’s “War Damage Restoration Plan”, Ishikawa
came up with the notion of “people building the city” in the belief that civic thoughts and actions moldthe city’s character. Therefore, the rebuilding of Kabukichō was structurally centered around the plaza—according to Western architectural theory, under a democratic government, the plaza is an urban
space imbued with the functions of political debate, commercial exchange, and social interaction.
Here, the activist work by Chim↑Pom seeks to place the “soul” of Kabukichō under a two-level
construction: one puts “Scrap and Build” into action, drawing a “blue print”, while the other draws theritualistic tone of Scrap and Build’s logic into debates surrounding public space.

力比多电力转换机“Erokitel”版本》（版权：Chim↑Pom，鸣谢：艺术家和东京MUJINTO Production，摄影：KENJI MORITA）/ Chim↑Pom, “Libido-Electricity Conversion Machine
Chim↑Pom ，《‘Erokitel’ Fifth Version” (© Chim↑Pom; courtesy of the artist and MUJINTO Production, Tokyo; photoby KENJI MORITA)

版权

家和 京

Chim↑Pom ，《Build-Burger》， 2016（：Chim↑Pom；鸣谢：艺术东 MUJINTO
Production；摄 ：KENJI MORITA）/ Chim↑Pom, “Build-Burger”, 2016 (© Chim↑Pom; courtesy of影

the artist and MUJINTO Production, Tokyo; photo by KENJI MORITA)
Can society change art?
“(Can art change society?) We are not politicians. If politics can be said to change society, then art
precisely proves that human nature cannot change. It would be better to reverse the question and ask,
can society change art?”
Chim↑Pom[1]，2016.6
Comprised of architectural waste, the installation work “Build-Burger” runs from the ﬁrst ﬂoor to thefourth. “Offering”, a detailed work within the installation, invites the audience to pile up rocks takenfrom among the waste material. This gesture is inspired by the Japanese story On Sainokawara Dizou
Wasan, in which children who died under the age of ten would be sent to a place like the riverbank of
Sainokawara, there they would pile up stones to make a tower. If they got to layer one, they would see
their father; layer two, their mother; at layer three, they would become Buddha. But in the process ofbuilding the stone tower, they are constantly obstructed by the Oni (devil), so that the tower is
continuously destroyed. But with the bodhisattva Ksitigarbha’s help, these children are able tocomplete the tower so as to achieve samara. Going up the stairs, the entire second ﬂoor presents adomain of belief that maintains the balance of power: “Downtown Paradox” is like a robot vacuum’s
Zen exercise—as a cleaning tool, it engages in the paradoxical labor of cleaning and polluting. Just
like the paradoxical converter between “scrap” and “build”, the additive sum of normal cleaning
procedures and acts of polluting—equated with creative labor—amount to zero in the structural
system of conﬂicting logic; image creation and the erasure thereof co-exist in the same contradictory
entity. Simultaneously, the seemingly unending cycle of karma seems to afﬁrm that on the one hand,
the labor of art activists exists constructively in political contexts; on the other hand, it also suggeststhat the ideological prospects that art activists hope to create are nothing more than an unrealizable
future. Any realization of this goal is associated with time immemorial, yet art making is always
grounded in the present—ambitious outlooks dissipate in the inﬁnite deferment of time. As a result,any kind of ideologically-motivated art, though simultaneously possessing positivity and criticality, isbound to negate as well as terminate its own project every time it materializes.
On the third ﬂoor of the exhibition are “Super Rat” and “Black of Death”. In turning rats caught fromthe streets of Shinjuku into Pikachus, Chim↑Pom transforms action into spectacle, as ﬂocks of crows
circle the skies above Tokyo. Whenever people question what it is, exactly, that artistic actions canbring to society, there is already a presupposition that art, seen as useless, can only serve as the ﬁnal
celebratory act and express the status quo of aesthetics. Artists devoted to activism often attempt tocelebratory act and express the status quo of aesthetics. Artists devoted to activism often attempt tochange existing conditions at the social level, yet they cannot give up their identity as artists. As Boris
Groys said, the “art” component in art activism is often seen as the main reason in which the activism
itself fails at the level of practice and pragmatism in its immediate social and political impact.
Therefore, the way to break free of this failure is to give up on art, just as, as long as social andpolitical activism is not infected by the virus of art, it cannot fail. Now, problems concerning art
activism found in contemporary art debates mainly deal with art’s function as political protest, thearena or medium for social activism. Art activists are not only interested in working with art’s system ofcritique and its mode of operations; conversely, they also hope to use art to change these modes ofoperation themselves.

超 老鼠

景模型新宿

版权

家和 京

Chim↑Pom，《 级–实– 》，2016（：Chim↑Pom；鸣谢：艺术东
MUJINTO Production；摄 ：KENJI MORITA）/ Chim↑Pom, “SUPER RAT –Diorama Shinjuku–”,影

2016 (© Chim↑Pom; courtesy of the artist and MUJINTO Production, Tokyo; photo by KENJI
MORITA)超级老鼠 – 实景模型新宿– 》，2016（版权：Chim↑Pom；鸣谢：艺术家和东京
MUJINTO Production；摄影：KENJI MORITA）/ Chim↑Pom, “SUPER RAT –Diorama Shinjuku–”,
Chim↑Pom，《2016 (© Chim↑Pom; courtesy of the artist and MUJINTO Production, Tokyo; photo by KENJI
MORITA)死亡的漆黑》，2008、2016（版权：Chim↑Pom；鸣谢：艺术家和东京MUJINTO
影：KENJI MORITA）/ Chim↑Pom, “Black Of Death”, 2008, 2016 (© Chim↑Pom;

Chim↑Pom，《Production；摄

courtesy of the artist and MUJINTO Production, Tokyo; photo by KENJI MORITA)As art activists, Chim↑Pom is responding to the day-to-day collapse of contemporary social
conditions, attempting to replace social or non-governmental organizations based on different lines ofreasoning. The difference is that they are not quick to abandon art or to try to make it “useful”. It is justas Simon Critchley writes in The Problem of Hegemony, “politics begins right here, locally, practicallyand speciﬁcally, around a concrete issue.” Looking at the “speciﬁc actions” of Chim↑Pom—using a jet

ピカッ（pika）”in the Hiroshima sky, symbolizing the explosion of atomic bombs;

to write the words “or adding an image of nuclear power-plant debris to the bottom-right corner of “Myth of Tomorrow”, alarge-scale mural by Taro Okamoto located in Shibuya Station; or using VR equipment to reﬂect thedesires projected by Fukushima’s indigenous people living under low radiation…etc.—these so-called
actions should not have to be accomplished by running off to protest at some meeting of the G8; “Youshouldn’t meet your enemy on their ground, but on your own, on the ground that you have made yourown. Also, think of the money and time you save on travel!”
Using “ART is in the pARTY” as their “manifesto”, Chim↑Pom enlists live music, performance, andparty-themed carnival, as well as the ceremony in which all the exhibited works will be completely
destroyed by architecture specialists at the end of the exhibition (the exhibition itself will not actively
be taken down—it will also be destroyed by the demolition), to create a new kind of encounter.
Carnival gives “the world turned upside down” a legitimate existence. Although the subversive format
of carnival is nothing but an ecstatic experience and does not entail a substantial subversive effect, it
is in such a hyper-frenzied state that real subversion emerges—according to Bakhtin’s theory of theCarnivalesque, it provides a real method for realizing collective thought. Subversion is not only acharacteristic of the event itself; akin to the process of disintegration, it is a mode of living, a game inparallel to real life. The carnival is a kind of “realized utopia”. The ritualistic aspect of carnival ispremised on the separation between the real and the fantastic: whereas real life is serious, the latterprovides the tool for sacrilege and play. Entering the latter via the former, one could create on thebasis of the real, a new real that is simultaneously indirect, simulated, and open, through the ability togeneral one’s own symbols and concepts.
Carnival is a holiday ﬁlled with laughter. The main visual impact of Chim↑Pom’s poster “So see you
again tomorrow, too” is a muddy smile. It is as though when one feels the exhilaration of synesthesia
and experiences the process of being resurrected from death, a charming smile ﬂowers from the birthand experiences the process of being resurrected from death, a charming smile ﬂowers from the birthof a new world, whether it is heartfelt or bitter. Explaining the duality of laughter in carnivals, Bakhtinsays, “carnivalistic laughter likewise is directed toward something higher—towards a shift ofauthorities and truths, a shift of world orders. Laughter embraces both poles of language, it deals withthe very process of change, with crisis itself. Combined in the act of carnival laughter are death andrebirth, negation (a smirk) and afﬁrmation (rejoicing laughter). This is a profoundly universal laughter, alaughter that contains a whole outlook on the world. Such is the speciﬁc quality of ambivalent carnivallaughter.”
When the exhibition is completely destroyed, Chim↑Pom will collect the fragmented pieces of artworks
that will have shared the same fate as the buildings and reconstruct them. From the neon letters takenfrom the to-be-demolished PARCO department store, we will keep the letters “C” and “P” that
represent Chim↑Pom. Chim↑Pom will present an exhibition comprised of these fragments in GARTER
art space as a follow-up to “So see you again tomorrow, too?” The phrase “So see you again
tomorrow, too?” is taken from the closing line of television host Kazuyoshi Morita’s variety show “It’s
OK to Laugh!”, a long-running show that lasted 32 years. In the production of the ﬁnal episode, eventhough it was clear that there would be no more chances to “see you again”, Morita still ended with
“So see you again tomorrow, too?” As “the end” will surely come, Chim↑Pom asks the audience of“tomorrow” for the scrap and rebuild of the future.

人们造了一座城》（左）、《五环》（中）和《都市悖论》（地板装置），2016（版权：Chim↑Pom；鸣谢：艺术家和东京MUJINTO Production）/ Chim↑Pom, “The People Make theChim↑Pom，《City” (left), “Five Rings” (center), and “Downtown Paradox” (ﬂoor installation), 2016 (© Chim↑Pom;
courtesy of the artist and MUJINTO Production, Tokyo)

制未来》，2016 （版权：Chim↑Pom；鸣谢：艺术家和东京MUJINTO

Chim↑Pom，《绘影：KENJI MORITA）/ Chim↑Pom, “Drawing Mirai”, 2016 (© Chim↑Pom; courtesy of

Production；摄

the artist and MUJINTO Production, Tokyo; photo by KENJI MORITA)

Chim↑Pom

的成员在开幕派对上祝酒（摄影：YUKI MAEDA） / Chim↑Pom members make a toast at

the opening party (photo by YUKI MAEDA)聚集在实验剧团Akumanoshirushi的人群（摄影：YUKI MAEDA） / Crowd gathering aroundexperimental theater group Akumanoshirushi (photo by YUKI MAEDA)

在 的上空炸一下“，《知日·现代霓虹艺术力》，总35期，2016.6[1] “ 艺术>> print

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