Far East Alliance

July 26 – August 20

Erehwon Center for the Arts
1 Don Francisco St.,Villa Beatriz, Quezon City, Philippines

Far East Alliance – a group exhibition of 6 Japanese Artist.

You all are invited to the opening reception at 4PM on July 26, Sunday!

The exhibition runs until August 20.

Participating artists:

Atsuko Yamagata
Marie Ikura
Mayuko Fukumoto
Nobuhiko Terasawa
Yasutaka Hayashi
Yuzo Shimomura

“Sextuplet Appeared From Divergences”

written by Nobuhiko Terasawa
translated by Ai Tomobe

One of the common views on the human nature of Japanese people is that they are more occlusive than any other races and ethnic groups since ancient times. The key to search for the basis of such is “an extremity of introversion,” which is a dominant characteristic of the great majority of Japanese people.

“Murahachibu” is a classic example of Japanese culture which subsists both “occlusive feeling” and “introversion.” “Murahachibu” is an ostracism, the act of deliberately not including those who breaks rules in a group or activity except in the case of the burial and fire that may cause troubles to others if they do not help. It indicates that a group is made under a strong solidarity in Japan which reinforces the “introversion” of society itself that leads people to keep their personal opinions and thoughts out.

Six artists, including myself, who organize these exhibitions, were born and lived in Japan, the country which is equipped with such. Although our hometowns, ages and makings differ from each other, we have something in common. We all lack both “occlusive feeling” and “introversion;” DIVERGENCES FROM BEING CLASSIC JAPANESE. And “WE” all wanted a challenge in abroad.

On the other hand, we have a common trait that we all are Japanese. Additionally, “emotionality” is a big element common to all six artists and of our works. Each artist has his/her own way on how delicately or neurotically handles his/her media that is somewhat alike purification, which produces a hysterical tension and madness. We believe that the foundation of “bi (beauty)” created by Japanese is the repetition of acts that morbidly obscures such “emotionality.”

Lastly, Japanese people including ourselves were the people who used the word of “bi (beauty)” before the word “art” was introduced. The Chinese character of “bi (beauty)” represents a big sheep in a good shape, which was the most important livestock for the people of Chou, an ancient dynasty in China, and it was the symbol of sacrifice in a ritual. Then it came to mean the valuable thing, and thus the representation of art was called as “bi (beauty)” until the late Edo era. In the last days of the Tokugawa Shogunate, craftworks and artworks created by the shogunate and clans exhibited at the international exposition in Europe were praised highly as excellent ornaments, which revved up interests in Japanese craftworks from Europe, and which could have raised the possibility of becoming the profitable exports. However, because there was no strict distinction between “arts” and “craftworks” like Europe in Japan, Japanese art works were generally regarded as decorative and artistic, and were considered to be inferior to European artworks. Through the modernization after Meiji Restoration and rapid changes in society, Japanese government had rapidly introduced the concept of European style “fine art” in order to keep up its appearances against other countries. Such was in 1863. That is to say that our Japanese history of “fine art” is only 150-year old, and is far behind from the sophisticated Western/European art in terms of its philosophy and representation.

“The fine art in Japan today,” in my opinion, has a key which can solve the missing link between “bi (beauty)” and “art.” The six artists here are the people who always seek for and/or keep creating such the key.