KAMUY, the creation of Japanese director Yukihiro Shoda, will have its U.S. debut on Dec. 6, 2017, in the vibrant and edgy Wynwood section of Miami, amid the influx of art patrons and creative connoisseurs during Art Basel Miami weekend.
Yukihiro Shoda, based in Tokyo and Los Angeles, is known for his expansive visual expression and creative storytelling. Shoda uses color and thrilling live-action presentations to depict his masterful unique style, while encouraging his audience to question "the norm."
Shoda states “For KAMUY, I challenged myself to create a visual experience to intensify things we tend to overlook in our daily lives.” “In society, you feel it, but you let it pass since its invisible, like air. I believe that even if it looks unrelated, everything in this world is information that forms what human beings are. To be more specific, I visualized the invisible world where everything affects each other, imaging the perspective of a fetus in a womb. Then I wanted to create this special environment for the audience to experience it”.
Shoda dates his transition as an artist to filmmaking to the devastating earthquake and tsunami, and the Fukushima nuclear plant explosion, of March 2011.
He says “I returned to Tokyo in May and felt this sense of discomfort where people were going through their daily lives as if nothing had happened.”
Experiencing the cloud of numbness that struck people after those disasters propelled Shoda as a visual story teller. “I felt the need to express that atmosphere through film. I made a short film called 'Blind.' Through that project, I had the first experience of being conscious about expressing my thoughts through storytelling. This was my moment, I wanted to use film as a media, where it is a seamless sequence of motion picture with a timeline of story, rather than a single image media. Since then, I’ve been using film as my favorite medium for creative expression.“
Shoda intends KAMUY and all his works to be universal...
“I think it depends on the artist and the work, but my work wants to be universal, and I think art is something like that. Perhaps because I grew up in a country with a special environment and language which is quite different from the West, I feel strongly that I should not express my art only in a domestic manner. Of course I also like the original sensibilities and expressions in Japan, but I am trying to be a universal artist based on that.”
“I think that the viewer can enjoy and understand the work more in a proper cultural context. But there must be something that is felt beyond that, it's sad otherwise. Especially, I believe films can convey culture and understanding more easily, beyond words.”
Yukihiro Shoda’s presentation of KAMUY is a big undertaking as the large viewing dome is a site specific installation. Mt. Melvil, the production company headed by founder Motoki Tomatsu, assembled a team to design a viewing dome which facilitates the multisensory environment that manifests Shoda's artistic genius.
Shoda comments “KAMUY was a conscious extension of the video format. Specifically, I visualized the appearance of the world - ‘It is invisible but indeed influenced’ - through the viewpoint of a baby in an invisible womb, and to experience it, I wanted to make it a special environment. I appreciate the benefits of technology, to be able to experience the work more deeply, such as the presence of projectors and speakers that can reproduce a special way of viewing the work. As a result, I learned for myself that the influence on the body affects the sensation of viewing.”
The opening reception for KAMUY will be on December 6th from 3pm to 8pm at the KAMUY Dome located at 270 NW 23rd St., Miami, Florida. The KAMUY Dome installation and film will be up until December 9th. There are two showings per hour and space is limited for each viewing.
Tickets to experience KAMUY may be secured online at http://nion.tokyo/kamuy/en/
For more information contact Aria C. Gannon, aPR Creative Marketing Management
ariacorinne@yahoo.com 818.720.1728 www.aprcreativeconsulting.com