“Yu Araki: LE SOUVENIR DU JAPON” is a very impressive exhibition that is being held at Shiseido Gallery, Ginza. I got the feeling that I met a new visual experience when I entered there. In this presentation, Araki has challenged to make a mental scenery with a timeline of Waltz and gazes of the Orient and the Occident based on 2 literary works that are “The Ball”(written by Ryunosuke Akutagawa） and “Japoneries d’Automne”（written by Pierre Loti.）

Araki’s work is made of 2 movies which express points of view that are from 35-year-old Loti and 17-year-old Japanese woman. Each movie is projected on the front and back of a screen, and They sometimes overlap each other. Their subjective films that were shot by iPhone seem to re-enact sights that 2 people had seen over 100 years ago, and Their are somehow wacky. 2 protagonists’ crazy dance in the movie make a kind of funniness.

According to a caption, each video’s hue is purposely shifted, and they are displayed as movies with proper color when they overlay each other on the front and back of the screen. It means that Araki’s video work complete by overlapping of 2 protagonists’ points of view. I was moved by his deep understanding of media and sharp intuition.

Anyway, I’d like to recommend that you experience his work if you are looking for a place to see during your travels in Tokyo. The exhibition opens until 23 Jun., 2019.

This is chandelier work at the exhibition’s entrance. It looks like Mobius strip and seems to mean a twist of space-time that is a theme of the show implicitly.