Yayoi Kusama, int’l artists participate in major east Japan visual art, music festival

SODEGAURA, Chiba — Over 80 artists and groups from 17 countries and regions are participating in a large-scale art festival hosted by five cities along Tokyo Bay in east Japan’s Chiba Prefecture.

The “Hyakunengo Art Festival – Uchiboso Art Festival,” an event commemorating the 150th anniversary of Chiba Prefecture, is being held in the cities of Ichihara, Sodegaura, Kisarazu, Kimitsu and Futtsu, and will run until May 26. Domestic and international artworks are on display, and live music events joined by Mr. Children singer Kazutoshi Sakurai and singer-songwriter Shikao Suga are also scheduled for April 20 and 21.

The festival features both art and music, and embraces a new form of artistic expression by fusing art, creativity and technology. It is labeled as an art festival that aims to create “new values” for 100 years into the future. The general producer is musician Takeshi Kobayashi, and the general art director is Fram Kitagawa, who has been involved in many art festivals in Ichihara and elsewhere.

Eighty-seven individual artists and units are participating, with 91 works including paintings, sculptures, videos and installations on display both indoors and outdoors. The festival also offers visitors the opportunity to discover the charms of each of the five cities while touring around them.

As collaborative events, workshops are also being held where visitors can appreciate the works together with the artists. In Sodegaura, about 60 people including parents and children tried their hand at creating Balinese “cakra kul-kul” windmills with Indonesian multimedia artist Dadang Christanto, 66, on March 24.

Cakra kul-kul, made mainly of bamboo, is a local folk art that farmers install in rice paddies before and after the harvest season to thank the gods of rice fields and winds for the harvest. The windmills are said to reflect people’s wishes for a bountiful harvest. Christanto, who first saw cakra kul-kul when he visited Bali in the 1970s, collected ones scattered in the area and installed them along a rice field path in Sodegaura, making them an artwork.

Participants in the program viewed about 40 of the cakra kul-kul along the path in the rice paddies with Christanto. They then went to a nearby community center to create their own works. A craftsperson was also present to advise participants. The completed cakra kul-kul made a pleasant, dry sound when they caught the wind. With a smile on his face, Christanto said that it was fun to make the windmills with kids. He added that it may not be possible to stay positive about the outlook for a century from now, but he wants to remain optimistic.

(Japanese original by Shigeharu Asami, Kisarazu Local Bureau)