Exhibitions 2001-02 (English) / Contemporary Art Center, ATM

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Exhibitions Planned at ATM, 2001-02

SPACE ODYSSEY
Feb. 10 (Sat.) To May 6, 2001 (Sun.)

Mito City Art Festival Special Art Exhibition
THE WIND from MITO 2001
-- Paintings, Sculpture, Crafts, Design, Japanese Calligraphy and Photography --
Artists: Kakujiro Miyamoto, Toshimitsu Isozaki, Susumu Onose, Yoichi Kataoka, Masaru Shimizu, Toshiyuki Suzuki, Hideo Tatsumi, Ryozo Sudo, Noriko Tanaka, Bairi Kubota, Juseki Sekiya, Soun Shoji, Tetsushi Yoshizawa, Shin-ichi Ono, Masao Seki, Masao Fujii, Isamu Murofushi, Katsuhiko Ose, Hiroyuki Shimada, Junko Shichiji, Naohisa Koshika Suekichi Goto, Seiji Noujima Juhaku Inoue, Masami Matsuda
May 19 (Sat.) To Jun. 3, 2001 (Sun.)
Admission: ¥500 general, Free Students (through 9th grade), senior sitizens (65 and older) and handicapped persons

Learning Citizens' Lecture #1 Venice/London Art Tour
Jun. 6 (Wed.) To 12, 2001 (Tue.)

Promenade in Asia - CUTE
Aug. 10 (Fri.) To Oct. 21, 2001 (Sun.)
In cooperation with Shiseido Gallery, Art Tower Mito is pleased to present an exhibition simultaneously treating four different themes, each from a different part of Asia (China, Japan, Korea, and Taiwan).
The exhibition focuses on works by the younger generation of East Asians, revolving around the key word of "cute."
With the relentless advance of economic development in recent years, people's lifestyles have become more uniform.
Particularly, the countries of East Asia, lying in close geographical proximity, are gradually coming to resemble one another.
Although Japan used to look upon its neighbors as "near, but far" countries, it would perhaps be better now to call them "near, and near."
The people of East Asia in the current era can be said to share the following perception in common: they are all happy in the present moment, thanks to economic prosperity, but at the same time they are vaguely anxious about what the future has in store.
That leads us to the theme of the exhibition: we have chosen the term of "cute" to describe the ambiguous feeling (happiness combined with anxiety) held by many Asians today.
We are not using "cute" merely in the sense of being charming, lovely, or sickeningly sweet, but also to mean the fervent desire of artists to impart their works with the evanescent feeling of being happy "right now and here" -- a feeling that may be lost at any moment. Altogether the works of nine artists will be introduced.
Artists: Ai Iijima, Wakako Kawakami, Ku Shih-yung, Minako Nishiyama, Park Hong-chun, Yao Jui-chung, Wang Jun-jieh, Wang Qing-song, Wang Te-yu

Shiseido Gallery: "Asia Sanpo -- After Kitsch"
Kitsch may be described as a "condition that arises during the process of adopting things from someone or somewhere else, and transforming the original into something new."
East Asia now finds itself in sort of a kitschy situation: a stage of infancy, about to give birth to a new originality.
The exhibition reflects upon the uniqueness of contemporary art on the East Asian scene -- somewhat different in nature from the original works that one hopes eventually emerge when that infant stage has passed.
(Excerpted and summarized from a press release by Shiseido's Corporate Culture Division)

Learning Citizens' Lecture #2 "La Biennale di Venezia and Art in the 21st Century"
Sept. 8, 2001 (Sat.)
Lecturer: Eriko Osaka (Chief Curator, Contemporary Art Center, ATM)
Eriko Osaka, Chief Curator of ATM's Contemporary Art Center, was deeply involved with the 49th Biennale at Venice as commissioner of the Japanese Pavilion.
In the lecture, she delivers a report on new trends in art in a readily understandable manner, focusing on the Japanese Pavilion.

TADASHI KAWAMATA DAILY NEWS
Nov. 3, 2001 (Sat.) To Jan. 14, 2002 (Mon., Coming-of-age Day Holiday)
A solo exhibition of the works of the artist Tadashi Kawamata, born in 1953. Active worldwide, he is especially known for his giant outdoor installations.
The ATM exhibition takes a special look at two of Kawamata's projects.
The first, located in the Gallery, consists of a space formed out of old newspapers, treating them as symbols of daily information that has been accumulated. Kawamata has taken bookshelves full of documents describing the work he has carried out over the past two decades, as well as notes from workshops he conducted in the 1990s, and scattered them around the installation. He thus gives expression both to the time in which he himself has lived, along with the broader flow of time.
The second installation encompasses one year of Kawamata's activities, in the form of the publication of an "artistic book" that covers and records his work at Mito, along with descriptions of other various projects carried out in the same year. In that way, the installation stretches the boundaries of traditional exhibitions, regarding the process of a developing a work of art -- one that has not fully revealed its final shape but is still coming into being -- as art in itself. The intention is to turn the book into a work of art.
The Kawamata exhibition represents an attempt -- on an unprecedented scale -- by the ATM Contemporary Art Gallery to devote the whole gallery to a solo exhibition. It is the first time in the world for such innovative works to be announced.

Concurrent Criterium 47 Tomoko Maezawa
Nov. 3 (Sat., Culture Day Holiday) to Dec. 2, 2001 (Sun.)
Workshop * During the first part of the exhibition period, Tomoko Maezawa will also be giving a workshop.
One of the special features of her artworks is the way that viewers are drawn into them, unknowingly, as participants. Namely, before one knows it, one's attention is drawn to the way that one takes a fresh look at things that are normally overlooked, such as the overall structure of a space or to the things left lying in the cracks.
In the workshop, she focuses on our everyday habits and actions, transporting them into an artistic space. While offering an opportunity for us to renew our ideas about everyday things, she also explores the fine line between what is art and what is not.

Concurrent Criterium 48 Mika Kato
Dec. 8, 2001 (Sat.) To Jan. 14, 2002 (Mon., Coming-of-age Day Holiday) Contents to be announced later.

Learning Citizens' Lecture #3 "Local Communities and Art -- Reflecting upon the Echigo-Tsumari Art Triennial 2000"
Nov. 17, 2001 (Sat.)
Lecturer: Fram Kitagawa (director, Art Front Gallery)
ATM welcomes Fram Kitagawa, general director of the Echigo-Tsumari Art Triennial 2000, the "Festival of the Earth." The exhibition was held in the summer of 2000 over an extensive area that included six municipalities (city, towns, villages) in the Echigo-Tsumari region of Niigata Prefecture.
He will tell us about the connections between local communities and art, using a variety of perspectives.

BEAUTIFUL LIFE?
Jan. 26 (Sat.) To Mar. 31, 2002 (Sun.)
In the midst of the ongoing sophistication of information technology and the burgeoning consumer society, the environment in which we find ourselves today is experiencing dizzingly fast changes, leading to great transformations in the way we live.
The exhibition casts light upon minor things, memories and actions of everyday life that we hardly ever pay any attention to, and imparts with us a new realization about the way we lead our lives.
The artists participating in the exhibition extract and isolate various elements making up our daily lives -- including urban scenery, environmental problems, houses, families, and transport -- and express them through variegated artistic techniques, such as installations, videos, paintings, and photographs.
Each of the artists approaches the concept of the "everyday" in his or her own way, casting a critical eye on the ever-changing nature of family relationships and other realities.
The purpose of the exhibition is to enable viewers to grasp a new perspective on everyday life, by contemplating upon the sort of situation we find ourselves in the modern day, and exploring the various avenues of living that are possible amidst that situation.

Artists: Heike Kati Barath (b.1966), Nobuaki Date (b.1964), Hiroshi Fuji (b.1960), Maria Hedlund (b.1961), Zon Ito (b.1971), Youngjin Kim (b.1961), Toru Koyamada (b.1961), Julia Loktev (b.1969), Tazro Niscino (b.1960), Saki Satom (b.1969)

Concurrent Criterium 49 Keiko Sono
Jan. 26 (Sat.) to Feb. 24, 2002 (Sun.)

Concurrent Criterium 50 Asako Otsuka
Mar. 2 (Sat.) to Mar. 31, 2002 (Sun.)

Learning Citizens' Lecture #4
(Details to be announced later.) Feb. 2002

ATM Contemporary Art Gallery's
Pass for Adults

A pass has been designed for adults aged 20 and older, letting the holder make an unlimited number of visits to the Contemporary Art Gallery's exhibitions for one year from the date of purchase.
The price is ¥2,000. The artwork on the pass has been designed by Hiroko Ichihara, an artist who incorporates words in her works. The logo on the pass reads: "Contemporary art -- as easy as pie." The pass is on sale at the ticket counter in Art Tower Mito.

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