The Absence of Neighbor Jimmy
OKAZAKI ART THEATRE [Japan]
Text, Direction: Yudai Kamisato [Japan]
November 2 (Fri) - November 6 (Tue) Owlspot Theater
FESTIVAL/TOKYO
Performing Arts Festival launching from Tokyo
About
Yudai Kamisatoʼs OKAZAKI ART THEATRE made its debut in the F/T Main Program last year with "Hemispherical Red and Black", raising issues of immigration, Japan-U.S. relations and the Fukushima disaster in an ironic and frenetic way. F/T12 sees Kamisato invited to the Main Program for a second year in a row and his theme this time will be "neighbours".
Following his participation in a discussion program at the Berlin Biennale this spring, the director also took in a festival in Belgium and visited Morocco, travelling in Europe and Africa for a total of 3 weeks. This experience of encountering and speaking with others as part of the process of a journey produced the hints for the theme he is tackling now.
"How much do we know about our neighbours? Arenʼt we surely making assessments on them while we donʼt know?" asks Kamisato. His questions are intuitively simple and acute. "If you have no neighbour then you cannot make assessments, cannot reflect on what youʼve done or even be aware of your own self." As part of his creative methodology for this new work Kamisato will spend some time in Korea, a country unmistakably Japanʼs "neighbour" whether viewed historically, culturally, politically, economically or, of course, geographically. From this distance Kamisato will then once more try to imitate his own self and that of the nation of Japan.
This reciprocal work is the principal of creating forms of human relationality: viewing the neighbour from the neighboring side; viewing yourself from the neighboring side; being viewed; viewing the neighbour from yourself. We stand now at a turning point in history where the self-portrait of the Japanese will be irradiated and exposed again. Do we avert our eyes from this? What do we think about it? These are the questions that will be thrown at audiences in this brand new work by an up-and-coming young local theatre artist.
