I dreamed I was wearing a necktie on my chest, and a T-shirt on the back.
One cannot explain "A" just by calling it "A". It’s like explaining that "tofu is tofu because it’s tofu" without actually saying anything. It takes some additional vocabulary, and that little extra is where drama meets creativity.
It’s like with double personalities, and related to the fact that individuals like myself, who call themselves art coordinators, administrators, curators or producers, look kind of suspicious. What we do is like wearing neckties on our chests and T-shirts on our backs. We need to be somewhat double-tongued in order to communicate the "enigmatic alien concepts of artistic expression" to the man in the street, and that double-edged thing is in fact something quite essential. For example, imagine an oily dish that you wash with detergent. The detergent is composed of molecules similar to those of oil, conjugated with molecules similar to those of water. The detergent approaches the oil molecules pretending to be on their side, but once it’s close enough, it drops the mask like a kabuki actor to reveal its true nature, and takes the oil molecules with it into the water. That’s how detergents work. Such double-tonguedness (or double personality) is what I consider to be the bottom line of communicating information — a transmission and communication system based on the double-helix structure of DNA.
About 20 years ago, I once wrote the following when working for PH Studio. It’s about "proper guerilla":
"Whenever you do weird or radical things, you better do it properly. That’s because it'll last longer that way. When talking to authorities, straighten up under your ragged coat and speak out loud. What’s important is to get the message across. In order to shake ourselves aware, we in the city, who for the past 100 years have been wresting energy from "Asia","local wisdom" and "nature", must dig deeper into our urban environment, think, and open our mouths in a courageous manner. We must transfigure our bodies just a little bit, change our hostility to hospitality, gather experience in the city, and continue our proper guerilla."
This basic idea hasn't changed much since the launch of BankART 1929. Never be flattering, and never part in anger. It’s important to know how to treat each other, and how to treat each other not. The simultaneous realization of "guerilla" and something "proper" is of course tricky, but the traffic between society (common sense) and art (the alien concept) is what makes the journey of a job like mine enjoyable, and I'd indeed call it the true value of my work.
One such attempt is the "Landmark Project" exploring the possibilities of dormant or abandoned, unknown spaces. On the third floor of the BankART Studio NYK, Ushijima Tatsuji installed his useless machines, and Maruyama Junko scattered her "Silent Flowers", while OffNibroll’s video installation was making use of both the interior and exterior of the 1929 Hall. Okabe Tomohiko’s "Kotobuki Project" moved ahead in the form of a DVD, etc. All these works opened up fresh possibilities of existing frames of time, space and history. This spring, volume 3 of the "Landmark Project" is going to spread to the other side of Highway 16, where it will focus on the old restaurant area of Noge. In spite of the great damage suffered through the closure of the Yokohama and Sakuragicho stations on the Toyoko Line, Noge still exudes a typical Yokohama kind of atmosphere with its numerous jazz cafes and other places. On the other hand, there are empty spaces fenced off to prevent homeless people and abandoned bikes from gathering, and a growing number of vacant shops in the station building’s underground mall. A slender building stands aimlessly on a corner of a red-light district… Our question is now how artists approach these sceneries.
In any case, it’s again a "proper guerilla" that has to take place here, while we fulfill our part of the deal and continue to wear neckties and T-shirts.
BankART 1929 website: http://www.bankart1929.com/