In Tokyo it's 10C -- much more tolerable. You might head out first of all to Work People Not Allowed, the Bruno Munari show at Shiodome Italia Creative Center (transferred from the Milan Triennale, where it originated). Munari, the veteran Italian designer, maker of charming children's books and wooden toys, is a good example of the genre-crossing that -- you have a feeling -- is going to become today's theme. It's something that Tokyo does well, because of the way it tends to structure things. Cross-genre exhibitions mix up
After the Munari show at Shiodome (you lunch rapidly on lip-blackening squid ink pasta amongst svelte office workers in the faux-Italian piazza) you ride the Oedo line out to MOT -- the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, set in Kiba Park. They've got a big show on called Space for your Future, vaguely inspired by Buckminster Fuller. It's divided into four parts, Body Inner Space, Metaphor, Body Sensation and Memory / Data. The blurb says it "aims to give a spatial execution to a variety of concepts and projects that propose future spaces able to stimulate and transform the sensibilities, sensory perceptions, and intellectual curiosity of those within them. The idea of space implied in the exhibition's title does not simply mean physical space but rather space as an environment which envelops the individual; space as a being possessing both physical and spiritual sensibilities." Wow, space as a being with a spirit! How very Shinto! But overall, the show with its personalized micro-architecture theme (lots of nice little cyber-huts to explore!) reminds you of Takako Minekawa's Roomic Cube concept ("does your way of life require a room?") and a similar show at Tokyo Opera City a few years back called My Home is Yours / Your home is mine.
The MOT show is super-inter-disciplinary, and it's nice to see people like Bless and Cosmic Wonder in it. Sure, they're the same old faces (people you see every time you open Here and There magazine,
In the MOT bookstore you flip through the new edition of Art It magazine. They've changed the cover design! The editor's theme is Tokyo: city of chaos and transformation. "What is it about Tokyo suddenly inspiring such a blossoming of artistic creativity? In this issue, we test the pulse of the Japanese capital's ever-evolving art scene, focusing on three major 'cross-genre' exhibitions. Just what constitutes evolution in Japanese, and in world art?" Woah, they're on this "cross-genre" tip too! Something in the air!
Dusk is falling now (the days are short in December!) so it's time to head to Roppongi, where you're going to ride to the 53rd floor of a skyscraper, have a quick look at Tokyo's nightscape, then catch Roppongi Crossing 2007: Future Beats in Japanese Contemporary Art, the Mori art museum's annual survey of new Japanese art. No rush, the museum's open till 10pm. Here too the theme is fusion -- "For Roppongi Crossing 2007 four curators focused on the idea of intersection, selecting 36 artists whose work has an energy and sphere of influence that spreads beyond the confines of conventional artistic categories. Their art takes a variety of forms, including painting, sculpture, photography, design, video, manga, games, and even unlikely genres such as dollmaking and bathhouse mural painting". As usual, you're a bit nervous about earthquakes as you walk round on top of the Mori skyscraper. But your mind is taken off imminent death (and it would be a glamourous one, at least) by Koichiro Tsujikawa's video for Cornelius' "Like A Rolling Stone", a twirling field of formal synergies played out by stiff little figurines (or, if you prefer, a visual metaphor for a society waltzing in harmony) -- and the perfect way to end the perfect December day.
