VietNamNet Bridge - The exhibition entitled “Future Bodies of Asia”willfeature video, installation and performances by three artists from Japan: Off-Nibroll, Fuyuki Yamakawa and Atsuhiro Ito. The event will take place from August 25 to September 9 at Salon Saigon, Heritage and Contemporary Art, 6D Ngo Thoi Nhiem Street, District 3, HCM City.

Artwork by Fuyuki Yamakawa

Since entering the 21st century, our lives have rapidly changed due to highly developed information technology and digital technology. In such time, senses of our physical bodies have been expanding at a daily level through various platforms such as virtual reality, the internet and mobile tablets, causing extensive transitions to our physical senses.

This project will feature the aspect of transforming human bodies by the cause of technologies, as well as how regional cultures and human bodies could relate to each other, by investigating and exploring what physical bodies could be in Asia at this time through exhibitions, performances and discussions.

Besides video, installation and performances by three Japanese artists, a special selection of video works by local artists Le Hoang Bich Phuong and Xuan Ha will also accompany the last presentation of this traveling project (first presented in Japan, then Singapore and Thailand since early 2017). 

On the opening night, Fuyuki Yamakawa will also delivers a collaborative performance with local musician/producer Do Tan Si.

This project is curated by Kenji Kubota.

Off-Nibroll was formed in 2005 by visual director Keisuke Takahashi and choreographer Mikuni Yanaihara. They explore the unlimited possibilities offered by space, body and visual images by performing not only in theatres but also in a variety of spaces such as public spaces, museums and galleries. 

Their major exhibitions include ‘a quiet day’ (solo), Yokohama Creative Center, Yokohama, Japan (2012); ‘Artist meets KURASHIKI vol.5’ (solo), Ohara Museum, Kurashiki, Japan (2009), ‘Art in Busan 2009 Inter-City’, Busan City Museum of Art, Busan, Korea (2009). 

They also participatedin international festivals such as ‘Echigo-Tsumari Triennial, Niigata, Japan (2006); ‘Shanghai Biennial’, Shanghai, China (2004). They have been awarded Re-Act 2007 prize and Mori Art Museum Membership Special Prize in 2004.

Fuyuki Yamakawa (born 1973, UK) is a ‘Khoomei’ singer, performer, sound creator who lives and works in Yokohama. He completed a Master Course in Tama Art University in 1999, and currently teaches at Tokyo University of the Arts and Tama Art University. His performance often includes his improvisation of musical happenings he picks up and amplification of the sound of his heartbeat with an electronic stethoscope. 

By expressing himself through sound and light, he creates a deep resonance to the space as well as to the audience. His major exhibitions include ‘Setouchi Triennale 2016, Oshima Port Area, Japan (2016); ‘Ominilogue Your Voice is Mine’, NUS Museum, Singapore (2013); ‘Atomic Site’, Contemporary Art Factory, Tokyo (2011). 

His recent performances such as “Black Hair Ballad” (2010) and ‘Pneumonia’ (2010) are highly commended. His installation work “The Voice-over”(2008) is in the collection of the Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo.

Atsuhiro Ito (b.1965) lives and works in Tokyo. He graduated from Tama Art University Master’s Degree Course in 1992. He launched his career as a visual artist in the late ’80s, and in 1998 began presenting sound performances. Ito made use of fluorescent lighting in the creation of an original musical device called “optron”. 

His major exhibitions include ‘vol.5 Atsuhiro ITO, Toshiya TSUNODA’, αM, Tokyo, Japan (2016); ‘V.R.Specter (solo), SNOW Contemporary, Tokyo, Japan (2012); ‘V.R.’ (solo), Hara Museum, Tokyo, Japan (2009); and ‘Roppongi Crossing’, Mori Art Museum, Tokyo (2004). Ito also performs extensively worldwide, including ‘Hear Here’, Bangkok Art & Culture Centre, Bangkok (2013); ‘NJP Summer Festival 21 Rooms’, Nam June Paik Art Center, Gyeonggi, Korea (2011); and ‘Singapore Arts Festival 2010’, Supperclub, Singapore (2010).

Le Hoang Bich Phuong (born 1984 in HCM City) is one of Vietnam’s most promising young artists whose study of Vietnamese and Japanese silk painting traditions has greatly influenced her own unique style and technique. 

Influenced by the ukiyo-e tradition, while also drawn to the popular world of the comic, her strong command of line and color creates an ethereal, near surreal presence. A graduate of the Ho Chi Minh City Fine Arts University, she was awarded an artist-in-residence in Sapporo, Japan, as part of the ‘JENESYS Program: Invitation Program for Creators’ of the Japan Foundation in 2011 and that same year was also one of the finalists for the DOGMA Art Prize in self-portraiture. In 2010 she was finalist in the ‘Talent Prize’ of the Cultural Development and Exchange Fund. Recent exhibitions include ‘Chain’ (solo), The Factory Contemporary Arts Centre, Ho Chi Minh City, 2017; ‘Bittersweet Whispers’, Salon Saigon, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam (2016); ’White, Black & Gold’ (solo), Japan Foundation, Hanoi, Vietnam (2015), ‘Above Under Sky’, Manzi Art Space, Hanoi, Vietnam (2014); ’Peonia Dream’ (solo), Phuong My Boutique, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam (2013); ‘A transformative disguise’ (solo), San Art, Ho Chi Minh City, and Japan Foundation, Hanoi, Vietnam (2012)

Xuan Ha (born 1993 in Da Nang) is an emerging visual artist and curator currently based in Saigon. Since 2015, she has been actively working with Vietnamese and foreign artists to produce exhibitions that focus on interactive and installation art. Her works take inspiration from the multitude of qualities, realities, bodies and identities that, fascinatingly and irresistibly, exist within and around herself and many other female persons she has encountered. 

Ha’s notable exhibitions include ‘I, Me, Mine’, The Factory Contemporary Arts Center, Ho Chi Minh City (2017); ‘Báo động show’, Chaosdowntown, Ho Chi Minh City (2017); ‘In_Ur_Scr!_Show’, Six Space, Hanoi and Chaosdowntown, Ho Chi Minh City (2016); ‘Queer Forever Festival’, Nha San Collective, Hanoi (2016); ‘She’, Dia Projects, Ho Chi Minh City (2016)

Do Tan Si (born 1997 in HCM City) is a musician and music producer based in HCM City. Teaching himself to play keyboard, bass, and later electronic instruments, Sĩ gradually developed a style of music that explores the labyrinth of the mind through sound. He also produces sound accompaniments for a number of visual artworks, be they installation or video, where his abstraction and propensity towards ambient noise complement the works’ disposition. Si co-founded Rắn Cạp Đuôi band with fellow “musical weirdos”, with whom he performs in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi.

T. Van