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Bontaro Dokuyama "Let There Be Light"
Leesaya
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Artists
Bontaro Dokuyama
Dokuyama Bontaro started his artistic practice after witnessing the utter change to his hometown of Fukushima brought about by the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami of March 11, 2011, and the meltdown of the reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear Power Plant.
The video work titled "Even After 1,000 Years" that Dokuyama made in 2015 took a poem titled "Childlike Story" as its motif. This poem appears in Chieko's Sky, a collection of poetry by Kotaro Takamura, a sculptor, and poet. In this work, Dokuyama stands on top of Mount Adatara in a driving rain and continues to yell, "The sky above here is the real sky!" The work conveys the resolve of those who decided to stay in their hometowns after the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant catastrophe. At the same time, many of their neighbors evacuated to other prefectures. In the same year, Dokuyama held masks-making workshops with residents living in temporary housing, whose real homes were in "difficult-to-return" exclusion zones. His work "Over There" shows the residents standing before their temporary houses, pointing toward their abandoned homes. It expresses the irritation these residents feel, who are generally lumped together as "victims," and their yearning for hometowns to which they cannot return.
To examine whether what he had been taught and believed thus far was true, Dokuyama made trips to various places where there remained deep resentment toward Japan. More specifically, following his previous trip to Fukushima Prefecture, where his hometown is located, he journeyed to Okinawa, Taiwan, South Korea, Shenyang, Changchun, Harbin, and Sakhalin. At these destinations, he interviewed people involved in or impacted by the events in question and prepared works that incorporated the interview footage and various information about the history, education, religion, customs, and other elements in each, all with vivid reality.
Dokuyama has pondered Japan and the society surrounding him with a multifaceted outlook. Since 2021, 10 years after the Great East Japan Earthquake, he has held the "Igene" tour project, which gives participants a look at the stark realities in Fukushima, a total of four times. The participants come from all parts of Japan. They are given a tour of the affected districts in the prefecture, from areas where entry restrictions have been lifted that have rows of new housing and are moving toward transmission of and recovery from the disaster to others that are untouched, where things have still not changed since right after the disaster. The project also contains programs enabling participants to hear views directly from the mouths of residents who lived in the affected areas on subjects such as the national scheme for compensation, experiences at evacuation destinations, life after returning to the original place of residence or its vicinity, and nuclear power generation. Dokuyama has a long-term perspective on the tour project and intends to continue conducting it.
Right from the start of his activities as an artist to the present, Dokuyama has unswervingly applied the approach of visiting the sites in question, interviewing the concerned principals, and facing up to their memories and sentiments, which are liable to be overlooked by history and lost. For this exhibition, he shows a new group of works that take "recovery" as their theme. The nature and fundamental toughness of human beings, who have no choice but to head for light and live even under the most challenging circumstances, and running contrary to it, the overwhelming reality casting deep shadows. This exhibition is bound to be necessary for the artist, who has probed postwar Japan from various angles.
The video work titled "Even After 1,000 Years" that Dokuyama made in 2015 took a poem titled "Childlike Story" as its motif. This poem appears in Chieko's Sky, a collection of poetry by Kotaro Takamura, a sculptor, and poet. In this work, Dokuyama stands on top of Mount Adatara in a driving rain and continues to yell, "The sky above here is the real sky!" The work conveys the resolve of those who decided to stay in their hometowns after the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant catastrophe. At the same time, many of their neighbors evacuated to other prefectures. In the same year, Dokuyama held masks-making workshops with residents living in temporary housing, whose real homes were in "difficult-to-return" exclusion zones. His work "Over There" shows the residents standing before their temporary houses, pointing toward their abandoned homes. It expresses the irritation these residents feel, who are generally lumped together as "victims," and their yearning for hometowns to which they cannot return.
To examine whether what he had been taught and believed thus far was true, Dokuyama made trips to various places where there remained deep resentment toward Japan. More specifically, following his previous trip to Fukushima Prefecture, where his hometown is located, he journeyed to Okinawa, Taiwan, South Korea, Shenyang, Changchun, Harbin, and Sakhalin. At these destinations, he interviewed people involved in or impacted by the events in question and prepared works that incorporated the interview footage and various information about the history, education, religion, customs, and other elements in each, all with vivid reality.
Dokuyama has pondered Japan and the society surrounding him with a multifaceted outlook. Since 2021, 10 years after the Great East Japan Earthquake, he has held the "Igene" tour project, which gives participants a look at the stark realities in Fukushima, a total of four times. The participants come from all parts of Japan. They are given a tour of the affected districts in the prefecture, from areas where entry restrictions have been lifted that have rows of new housing and are moving toward transmission of and recovery from the disaster to others that are untouched, where things have still not changed since right after the disaster. The project also contains programs enabling participants to hear views directly from the mouths of residents who lived in the affected areas on subjects such as the national scheme for compensation, experiences at evacuation destinations, life after returning to the original place of residence or its vicinity, and nuclear power generation. Dokuyama has a long-term perspective on the tour project and intends to continue conducting it.
Right from the start of his activities as an artist to the present, Dokuyama has unswervingly applied the approach of visiting the sites in question, interviewing the concerned principals, and facing up to their memories and sentiments, which are liable to be overlooked by history and lost. For this exhibition, he shows a new group of works that take "recovery" as their theme. The nature and fundamental toughness of human beings, who have no choice but to head for light and live even under the most challenging circumstances, and running contrary to it, the overwhelming reality casting deep shadows. This exhibition is bound to be necessary for the artist, who has probed postwar Japan from various angles.
Schedule | May 6 (Sat) 2023-Jun 4 (Sun) 2023 Opening Hours Information
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| Fee | Free | ||||
| Website | https://leesaya.jp/exhibitions/light/ | ||||
| Venue | Leesaya | ||||
| Location | 3-14-2 Shimomeguro, Meguro-Ku, Tokyo 153–0064 | ||||
| Access | 7 minute walk from Fudomae Station on the Tokyu Meguro line. 20 minute walk from the Main exit of Meguro Station on the JR Yamanote, Namboku, Toei Mita or Tokyu Meguro line. | ||||
| Phone | 03-6881-4389 | ||||
| Related images | Click on the image to enlarge it  |
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