Tomoko Mukaiyama

Tomoko Mukaiyama is a Japanese-Dutch pianist, artist and director. She is known for multimedial performances in which she combines performing and visual arts. Her work redefines the classical difference between composer, performer and audience by exploring their relationship and creative contributions as part of a performance’s broader artistic and thematic scope Sander van Maas (2009) “Wat is een luisteraar: Reflectie, interpellatie en dorsaliteit in hedendaagse muziek.” Utrecht University, inaugural speech for the chair Hedendaagse Nederlandse Muziek, 03-11-2009, p.7.. Mukaiyama pioneered the piano recital into an open artistic form, combining music, architecture, dance, film, visual arts, photography and fashion with social themes Rodrigues, Késsia Decoté. (2017). “For her: An exploration of a piano recital to raise awareness of social issues.” Ímpar: online journal for artistic research. Vol. 1, 2017, pp.29-37 (accessed, June 26, 2024)..
==Biography==
Mukaiyama was born in Shingu in the prefecture Wakayama, Japan The city of Shingu is located at the mouth of the Kumano River. Kumano is also the name of the surrounding area, known for its overwhelming nature, countless holy places, temples and pilgrimage routes from pre-modern Japan. It plays a major role in Mukaiyama’s involvement in nature and ritual and is a source of inspiration for Kumano (2021). See, https://visitwakayama.jp/en/stories/kumano. She has lived in Amsterdam since the early 1990s. She is the widow of photographer and writer Philip Mechanicus, who died in 2005. Mukaiyama has a daughter, Kiriko En Blanc et Noir (2009, artbeat publishers) originated as a commemoration, consisting of a book with unpublished photos by Philip Mechanicus and a CD with the improvisation Sonic Tapestry by Mukaiyama. For Mukaiyama’s daughter Kiriko Mechanicus see, https://www.kirikomechanicus.com/. 
Mukaiyama studied piano at the Musashino Music College in Tokyo, at the University of Indiana (Bloomington School of Music) and at the Sweelinck Conservatory in Amsterdam. She took private lessons in improvisation with pianist and composer Micha Mengelberg. Since 2020 she has been taking private lessons in electronic composition with the composer Yannis Kyriakides. 
==Artistic Career==
In the 1990s, Mukaiyama began her career as a pianist in the Dutch and international ensemble culture Hiu, Pay-uun. (1996) “ Een cultuur apart? De Nederlandse ensemblecultuur gespiegeld aan Europese ontwikkelingen.” In E. Schönberger et al (Eds.), Ssst! Nieuwe ensembles voor nieuwe muziek (pp. 24-58). Amsterdam. International Theatre & Film Books.. Through her playing, choice of repertoire, the dresses she wears and her interaction with the audience, it became clear that for her every concert is, always already, a multimedial expression for a multi-sensory, unrepeatable experience Koelewijn, Rinskje. (2014) “Lunchen met Tomoko Mukaiyama.” NRC, 27 september 2014 https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2014/09/26/de-donkere-kant-in-mij-dat-ismijn-vader-1422646-a516190. Her independent approach to the piano recital inspired many composers to write for her Andriessen, L., and M. Trochimczyk. The Music of Louis Andriessen. New York: Routledge. (2002), pp. 76-77. Compositions she premiered include, The memory of roses (1992) and TAO, part two of the Trilogie van de laatste dag (1998) of Louis Andriessen, Nederland, Muziekland (1994) of Martijn Padding, the Techno Etudes (2000) of Karen Tanaka, Night Butterflies (2013) and Bells (2019) of Alexander Raskatov, La Mode (2016) of Yannis Kyriakides, The Unchanging Sea (2016) of Michael Gordon.
After about a decade Mukaiyama widens her work as a pianist by creating performances that connect art and social themes. Amsterdam x Tokyo (2000) is her first work from this period. She connects the urban life of the two cities, as expressed through compositions of Japanese and Dutch composers, with a myriad of transparent bags with goldfish, one by one, hanging from the ceiling Mayu Nomura (2017), p. 36, discussing Karen Tanaka’s Technic Etudes (2000) as part of Amsterdam x Tokyo (2000). The other compositions include: Michel van der Aa, Just before (2000); Merzbow and Atsuhiko Gondaï, Black Mass (2000), Mokoto Nomura, Away from Home With Eggs (2000); Toek Numan, Fluweel (1999)..
In for you (2005) Mukaiyama deconstructs the classical piano recital by separating the listener from the collective of listeners that forms an audience. for you is a concert of 15 minutes for one listener in a concert hall with one chair Sander van Maas. (2009). “Wat is een luisteraar: Reflectie, interpellatie en dorsaliteit in hedendaagse muziek.” Utrecht University, inaugural speech for the chair Hedendaagse Nederlandse Muziek, 03-11-2009, pp. 7-10.. The consequence is a deregulation of the codes and conventions of the recital for listener and pianist, which opens up to a felt intimacy with the concert space, with music, with pianist or listener and with oneself Sander van Maas. (2009). “Wat is een luisteraar: Reflectie, interpellatie en dorsaliteit in hedendaagse muziek.” Utrecht University, inaugural speech for the chair Hedendaagse Nederlandse Muziek, 03-11-2009, p. 9.. for you (2005) thus involves a deconstruction of a piano recital that reopens and refigures musical issues of the agency of music, listener and pianist, of their relationship, of shared responsibility and of the acoustic space Karen Barad (2011), p. 148.
”Nature’s Queer Performativity.” Qui Parle. Vol. 19, no.2, 2011, pp. 121-158..
With wasted (2009) Mukaiyama created an installation-performance, a going together of art installation and musical performance, on the theme of women’s experiences with (in)fertility. The work resembles a cathedral of a thousand virginal white dresses forming a maze-like space through which visitors seek their way. In the center, where Mukaiyama improvises on Bach’s Goldberg Variations, hangs a torn and blood-soaked linen dress. The music and the dress reveal an abstract art work about the potentiality of life and death as an inescapable part of a woman’s life Nathalie Wind Soelmark (2014), pp. 161-176. “Atmospheres of belonging. The aesthetic qualities of the Japanese installation wasted on (in)fertility and American video blogs (vlogs) about IVF on YouTube.” In, Relational (Trans)formations (2014). University of Southern Denmark (USD). PhD dissertation..
Nocturne (2011), is a multimedial work created as commemoration of the earthquake and tsunami catastrophe of 2011 in Japan. It is an installation-performance with two destroyed pianos combined with images of the destructed region and recorded sounds of children. Mukaiyama plays the piano, including work of Frédéric Chopin. Visitors, all standing around the work, became part of this public ceremony Rodrigues, Késsia Decoté (2017). “For her: An exploration of a piano recital to raise awareness of social issues.”, p. 31. Ímpar: online journal for artistic research. Vol. 1, 2017, pp.29-37 . 
The audience in La Mode (2016) is immersed in the scene, becoming an integral part of a choreography where dancers start the backstage preparations and catwalk of a fashion show. It is a show in a show that evokes our commercial gaze, which, in fact, excludes people who produce the garments or who cannot afford them. The composition of Yannis Kyriakides and Mukaiyama’s playing accompanied the 10 dancers of the Spellbound Contemporary Ballet Bongani Tau. “Can I get a witness: sense-less obsessions, brandism, and boundaries by design.” In online Journal, Herri https://herri.org.za/9/
(n.d., n.p.)..
In pianist (2019) and figurante (2023) Mukaiyama uses dramaturgical-musical techniques to bring together the social and artistic and to get a grip on the resonance between different disciplines and the role they play in creating the musical and narrative line of a performance. In pianist (2019) Mukaiyama took the notion of human time regulation as starting point of her installation-performance. The performance in the Maison Hermès le Forum gallery in Tokyo started at the first day of spring. She gave piano recitals in an art installation of stacked and hanging grand pianos. Mukaiyama played around the clock for a period of 24 days: Each concert, lasting an hour and a half, started an hour later every day until the full 24 hours. The gallery was open only for the concert-hours every day See, Tokyo Art Beat https://www.tokyoartbeat.com/en/events/-/2019%2F97EE.
figurante (2023) is staged in a 500 ㎡ warehouse space. The floor and walls are covered with plants and natural materials. The audience is invited into ‘Nature,’ a dark space where the boundary between the audience and the performer gradually breaks down. All included are acting as extra’s who are confronted with the necessity to care about each other, to care about the light, to care about the performer, even to care about the narrative-line of the performance of which all are a constitutive part See, https://www.terrada.co.jp/en/news/7280/#:~:text=Warehouse%20TERRADA%20will%20host%20figurante,9th%20(Sun)%2C%202023.
Next to concerts and installation-performances Mukaiyama produces a series of music-cinema called A Live in collaboration with the Dutch cinematographer Reinier van Brummelen See, https://donemus.nl/tomoko-mukaiyama-piano-and-reinier-van-brummelen-video-perform-canto-ostinato-on-june-6th/ . Music-cinema are multimedia performances via livestream. It is a form of performance in which the creation of music, sound, images and film are performed as much as possible in real time to preserve the tension and creative indeterminacy of the live performance. The series consists of A live Vol. 1, 2 and 3, 2020, including TWO – in transit Hara Museum, 2021 Dianne Bleeker “Livestream: pianiste Mukaiyama in het Van Gogh Museum.” Het Parool, 10 juli 2020. https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2020/05/03/een-uitgekiend-precisiemechaniek-a3998578.
The openness of the artistic form of her work is affirmed in collaborations with very diverse artists, such as tech/noise-composer Merzbow and composer Atsuhiko Gondai in Amsterdam x Tokyo (2000), choreographer Jiří Kylián in Tar and Feathers (2006), composer Michael Gordon in The Unchanging Sea (2016), Architect Toyo Ito in La Mode (2016), composer Maxim Shalygin in GAKA the performance (2018) and GAKA the film (2020) and composer Agata Zubel in her Piano Concerto no. 2 (2022) Agata Zubel, https://zubel.pl/en/homepage ; Maxim Shalygin, https://maximshalygin.com/ .
==== Awards ====
In 1991 Tomoko won the International Gaudeamus Interpreters Award and in 1993 she received the Muramatsu Prize for outstanding musical talent. In 2014 she received the Dioraphte dance prize for the production ShirokuroTomoko received this prize in collaboration with the choreographer Nicole Beutler. https://www.theaterkrant.nl/nieuws/nbprojects-wint-dioraphte-dansprijs-met-shirokuro/. In 2017 she received the Japan Dance Forum Award for the production La Mode and HOME.
====Organisations====
In 2007, the Tomoko Mukaiyama Foundation (TMF) was founded. Through the foundation, Tomoko produces multimedia performances independently or in collaborations. The foundation is supported by, among others, the Performing Arts Fund NL. 
The Multus Foundation (MF) was founded in 2015 for performances in Japan. MF is supported by various Japanese government agencies. 
In 2020, Culture All Nippon (CAN) was founded by Tomoko in collaboration with Hiroko Tsuboi-Friedman, UNESCO associate in the field of artistic expression and diversity. CAN is a network organization with the aim of promoting the arts in Japan by supporting artists and arts policy through organizing meetings, lectures and discussionsMarch 4, 2023 CAN organised a round table discussion in Tokyo with the title “Creation, Womanhood, Motherhood.” Invited were, among others, Femke Halsema, mayor of Amsterdam and Satoko Kishimoto, mayor of Suginami, Tokyo. See, CAN on https://x.com/nippon_can/status/1632312518705139713
==Selected Works==
* Amsterdam x Tokyo (2000)
* for you (2005)
* haar/haar (2005)
* You and Bach (2006)
* Sommer Reisen (2007)
* Show me your second face (2007)
* BABY in coproduction with photographer Masafumi Sanai (2007-2011)
* wasted (2009)
* SHOES' (2011)
* Nocturne (2011)
* SHIROKURO (2012)
* Multus #1: Canto Ostinato (2012)
* Project 88 (2013)
* Falling (2013)
* Super T-Market (2013)
* East Shadow in coproduction with Jiri Kylian (2013)
* Multus #2: Dance on Piano (2014)
* Sonic Tapestry IV (2014)
* Multus #3: Canto Ostinato for 4 pianos (2015)
* Voor Elise (2015)
* La Mode (2016)
* Woman in the Dunes (2016)
* HOME (2016)
* GAKA (2019)
* Pianist (2019)
* ONE (2020)
* A Live vol. 1, 2, 3 (2020)
* GAKA film (2020)
* End and Beginning (2020)
* KOMANO (2021)
* TWO - in transit Hara Museum (2021)
* Love Song (2022)
* SADO (2023)
* figurante (2023)
* EAT (2023)
* Delirium (2023)
Recordings
* Women composers (1994, Vinyl 2019)
* Hello Pop Tart (1998)
* Amsterdam x Tokyo (2000)
* En Blanc et Noir (2009)
* Raskatov, Stravinsky (2014)
* Canto Ostinato (2015, vinyl 2019)
* The unchanging Sea (2018)
* La Mode (2021)
Video-livestream and Film
* A Live vol. 1. SUPER T market (2020)
* A Live vol. 2. Canto Ostinato (2020)
* A Live vol. 3. Night at the Van Gogh Museum (2020)
* GAKA-film (2020)
* Two- in transit Hara Museum (2021)
* Super T (e) market (2021)
==Bibliography==
Andriessen, L., and M. Trochimczyk. (2002). The Music of Louis Andriessen. New York: Routledge.
Barad, Karen. (2011).”Nature’s Queer Performativity.” Qui Parle. Vol. 19, no.2, 2011, pp. 121-158.
Bleeker, Dianne. (2020). “Livestream: pianiste Mukaiyama in het Van Gogh Museum.” Het Parool, 10 juli 2020.
Hiu, Pay-uun. (1996). “ Een cultuur apart? De Nederlandse ensemblecultuur gespiegeld aan Europese ontwikkelingen.” In E. Schönberger et al (Eds.), Ssst! Nieuwe ensembles voor nieuwe muziek (pp. 24-58). Amsterdam. International Theatre & Film Books.
Koelewijn, Rinskje. (2014). “Lunchen met Tomoko Mukaiyama.” NRC, 27 september 2014.
Maas, Sander van. (2009). “Wat is een luisteraar: Reflectie, interpellatie en dorsaliteit in hedendaagse muziek.” Utrecht University, inaugural speech for the chair Hedendaagse Nederlandse Muziek, 03-11-2009 https://www.uu.nl/organisatie/faculteit-geesteswetenschappen/onderzoek/oraties-en-redes 
Nomura, Mayu. (2017). An Examination of Karen Tanaka’s Approach to Minimalism: Water Dance and Techno Etudes. University of Arizona. Electronic dissertation. http://hdl.handle.net/10150/624575
Rodrigues, Késsia Decoté. (2017). “For her: An exploration of a piano recital to raise awareness of social issues.” Ímpar: online journal for artistic research. Vol. 1, 2017, pp.29-37 (accessed, June 26, 2024).
Schönberger, Elmer et al (Eds.). (1996). Ssst! Nieuwe ensembles voor nieuwe Muziek. Amsterdam. International Theatre & Film Books.
Soelmark, Nathalie Wind. (2014). “Atmospheres of belonging. The aesthetic qualities of the Japanese installation wasted on (in)fertility and American video blogs (vlogs) about IVF on YouTube.” In, Relational (Trans)formations (2014). University of Southern Denmark (USD). PhD dissertation.
Tau, Bongani. “Can I get a witness: sense-less obsessions, brandism, and boundaries by design.” In online Journal, Herri https://herri.org.za/9/
Category:People from Shingū, Wakayama
Category:Pianists
Category:Artists
Category:Director