JAPAN MEDIA ARTS FESTIVAL PARTICIPATION IN OVERSEAS MEDIA ARTS FESTIVAL

Exhibition

tricky women 2017

2017. 2.3-2.18

Report

The final major participation of the 2016 took place in Vienna at “tricky women 2017”, a co-organized event which featured screenings and a competition for works by female artists. The special exhibition “tenacious, gracious” was held from March 16th-23th with the Bildraum07 gallery.
In addition to the exhibition and screenings, there were also a live performance, talk event and workshop. There were screenings, too, at the Metro Kinokulturhaus of an exhibition-related program and the animated feature film, “Tamako Love Story” winner of the 18th Animation Division New Face Award.

Opening Performance

More than 140 people attended the opening at 19:00 on the evening of Thursday, 16th March. The welcoming address by Mitsuko Okamoto, Planning Director of the exhibition and Waltraud Grausgruber, Festival Director of tricky women 2017, was followed by a live drawing performance by Shinjuko. The guests eagerly photographed Shinjuko at work and also had the opportunity to have their photos taken with her later on in the event.

The Japan Media Arts Festival’s “tenacious, gracious” Exhibition

Curator Okamoto’s “tenacious, gracious” program of 12 works expressing femininity by female artists was screened at the cinema. Okamoto also made a short presentation about the program before the film was shown.

Curator’s Talk

Okamoto and Fumiyo Kouno, one of the participating artists, presented a talk show on Friday, March 17th. Books showing Kouno’s works from her early days to the present were prepared on the table and Okamoto introduced them one after another. Kouno’s works include many female protagonists and the show provided a valuable opportunity for participants to ask her directly about how she had chosen to draw them and what these works and characters meant to her.

Voices

OKAMOTO Mitsuko（Planning director, Professor of Department of Animation, Graduate School of Film and New Media, Tokyo University of the Arts）

tricky women is a festival of animated works by female directors held in the Austrian capital of Vienna since 2001. This is a small but exquisite festival where the competition and other works are of high quality, the festival directors and staff are extremely motivated and take good communication with the participants particularly seriously, and the Viennese audience is also very discerning. The Japan Media Arts Festival participation in overseas media arts festival presented both an exhibition and screenings at this film festival. The exhibition featured comics, videos, paintings, installations, live performance and other attractions by women artists across a wide range of media and the visitors clearly appreciated this introduction to the variety and freedom of Japan’s contemporary media arts scene. The direct participation of Fumiyo Kouno, who could be called the present face of Japanese media arts, was especially big and produced a lot of excitement. 12 animated short films and one animated future film were screened in the cinema. The audiences were large and appreciative and several distributors inquired how they could show these works abroad. The Festival, too, organized a Japanese focus on its own initiative to give this year’s tricky women a distinctly and excitingly Japanese feel. I am confident in saying that this whole project was a great success.
In addition to the formal participation, others Japanese creators whose works were screened were also eager to be a part of this and came at their own expense. This all became a most wonderful opportunity for the female artists. The Japan Media Arts Festival participation in overseas media arts festival project’s goal of nurturing media arts creators has surely been well served.

KOUNO Fumiyo (Manga artist)

I found it tremendously stimulating to see everyone’s video works and see so many women working different fields from my own. I thought comics were settling into fixed forms but realized here that we all have to be brave and try even harder to break out of our shells.

Shinjuko (Artist, Illustrator, Filmmaker, Installation artist, Performer)

I was determined to do something I’d never done before and produce something even better than the people who came to watch expected from me. All I wanted was for them to watch and feel it in their own way.

Special Exhibition in Wien on the Theme of tenacious, gracious

The tenacious, gracious exhibition will be held at the tricky women 2017 international animation festival, which opens in Vienna, Austria on Wednesday, March 15th.
The special exhibition is located at a city-center gallery “Bildraum 07” on Thursday, 16th to 23th March 2017. Taking the tenacity and graciousness of women for its themes, the exhibition has been compiled to disseminate the attractions of works made by female Japanese artist.

EXHIBITION

“KiyaKiya”

KONDOH Akino

[2012 / Animated short film / 16th Animation Division Jury Selection]Installation

The title of this work, “KiyaKiya”, derives from an old Japanese expression that the artist discovered in an essay, “On Childhood Experiences,” in SHIBUSAWA Tatsuhiko’s book “Introduction to a Collection of Girls”. The expression describes a sense of “inexplicably nostalgic anxiety” or a kind of dejavu. The film sets out to examine this feeling. (6 min. 39 sec.)

”KiyaKiya_painting11”[2013 / Oil]
Oil painting on canvas

“In This Corner of the World” (konosekai no katasumi ni)

KOUNO Fumiyo

[2007-2009 / Manga / 13th Manga Division Excellence Award]Original drawing, Replication drawing, Related materials

This work is something like a sequel to her outstanding work, “Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms”. This is the story of a family set during the Second World War in the city of Kure, Hiroshima. The heroine is URANO Suzu, who was born in the fishing town in Hiroshima. She marries HOJO Shusaku, a naval officer living in the uptown area of Kure city. Though confused by her new family, new town and new world, she lives with a sense of certainty and intense effort.

“Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms” (Yuunagi no Machi, Sakura no Kuni)

KOUNO Fumiyo

[2003-2004 / Manga / 8th Manga Division Grand Prize]Replication drawing

The setting is Hiroshima in 1955. This work portrays the reality of the A-bomb and the days thereafter, through the eyes of a woman. It asks what the war and the A-bomb mean to ordinary people.

“Yukisusumisariyuki”

KWGT

[2014 / Animated Short film]Animation screening

This animation is animated by the scrolling screen. The woman walks together with the changing scene. The spaces are fuzzy, the colours faint, and little by little the scenes collapse, patchily, never completely. There is no end in sight for as long as the scroll continues but there is a sense of nostalgia and loneliness. (2 min .01 sec.)

“2.5D Mask”

KWGT / IWABUCHI Maki / MIYAZAKI Mari

[2014 / Website / 19th Entertainment Division Jury Selection]　Installation

Paper craft masks that can be made by downloading open-source patterns from the Internet and printed on a regular A4 printer. By wearing the mask, one becomes “a nobody” or “a nobody character”, and images of people wearing these masks can be shared publicly on the Internet. These images, which capture the act of wearing masks that resemble animation characters, evoke a “2.5-dimensional” world that exists between two- and three-dimensional space.

“Futon”

MIZUSHIRI Yoriko

[2012 / Animated short film / 16th Animation Division New Face Award]Animation screening

You crawl inside your futon and everything — from the memories in your mind to thoughts of the future, recalled sensations, sexuality — all melt together into a single pleasant feeling. In the futon, your body wanders around in search of sensation. The soft texture of this animated work was achieved by drawing images on paper and then incorporating them into the picture frame via tracing paper. Futon deals with the relationship between movement and the senses.
(6 min. 02 sec.)

“Futon”　[2012 / Acrylic]
“Ikura” [2013 / Acrylic]
“Toe” [2013 / Acrylic]
Acrylic painting on canvas

“Pray”

Shinjuko

[2012 / Painting on folding screen]Installation

This is my home town. I found out women's history of my home town. It is the history about trafficked woman.
Currently I am wearing my art work and play.
This is the photo which my husband took.
＊Live drawing will be presented from 19：00 on 16th March.

“Shinjuko world”

Shinjuko

[2011―2016 / Video works]Video works presentation

This is a video anthology of Shinjuko’s representative works. The wide-ranging introduction to Shinjuko’s world includes an animation about how women age, a pop idol music video, and a “narration performance”.

“Cherry Chance!”　[2015 / Music video]
“Rumi Shihido [at INOKASHIRA]”　[2015 / Music video]
“Please★DNA”　[2016 / Music video]
“Shinjuko Exercise”　[2016 / Music video]
“The Sister is Ribbon Bow Mad”　[2011 / Music video]
“Shinjuko Performance of narrator in Japanese silent cinema” [2011 / Documentary video]

“YAMASUKI YAMAZAKI”

Shishi YAMAZAKI

[2013 / Animated short film / 17th Animation Division Jury Selection]　
Animation screening

When you feel delight, your joy feeds into itself making you forget the reason, and as the feeling passes through your entire body it embraces even sorrow and madness, before blossoming… Created as the end of 2013 approaches, this work expresses “innocent elation” at the opening of curtains onto a new year, coupled with the “joy so great that it makes you forget its reason” felt everyday by the creator. (2 min. 22 sec.)

Theme

“tenacious, gracious”

However much they may feel oppressed by a social ideology or historical system, or their lives may be devastated by war or natural disaster, women do choose to live tenaciously and manage to discover joy and entertainment within their difficult situations. Women are as gracious as the bamboo, bending but never breaking, and in this we discover the affirmation and glory of femininity. Their forms are strong and beautiful.
This exhibition features women artists in the world of Japanese media arts who tackle the questions of what it is to be female.
Women possess a consistent sense of self and affirm this in their way of life, aesthetic sense and even destiny. I hope that this exhibition will impart that “tenacious, gracious” sensibility.

Planning director: OKAMOTO Mitsuko

Artists

Exhibition　BildRaum 07
KONDOH Akino 　[Japan]
Visual artist and a Manga writer. Born in 1980 Chiba Prefecture. Lives and works in New York since 2008.
http://akinokondoh.com

KOUNO Fumiyo　 [Japan]
Manga artist. Born in 1968 Hiroshima Prefecture.

KWGT [Japan]
Born in 1992 Yamanashi Prefecture. Video grapher, animation artist.
http://kwgtms.tumblr.com/

MIZUSHIRI Yoriko [Japan]
Born in Aomori, Japan in 1984. Based in Tokyo. Filmmaker.
http://www.shiripro.com

Shinjuko 　[Japan]
Born in 1976 Amakusa, Kumamoto Prefecture. Artist, Illustrator, Filmmaker, Installation artist, Performer. She handled the illustrations for the works of Gwen Stefani, the founder of Harajuku Girls.
http://www.yan-oki.com/

Shishi YAMAZAKI [Japan]
Born in 1989 in Kanagawa Prefecture. Animation artist.　
http://www.shishiyamazaki.com

Screening 　Metro Kinokulturhaus
ARAI Chie　[Japan]
Born in 1971. Associate professor, Bunka Gakuen University.

Hu Yuanyuan [China]
Born in 1986 in Nanjing, China. She completed a master's degree in animation at the School of Film and New Media at Tokyo University of the Arts in 2012.

KABUKI Sawako [Japan]
Born in 1990 in Tokyo. llustrator and animation artist. Graduated from Tama Art University.
http://uykom.exblog.jp/

KOGUMA ATSUKO [Japan]
Born in Tokushima Prefecture. Animation artist.
http://koguma.tv/profile/index.html

KUGENUMA Ayasa　[Japan]
Born in Tokyo. Illustrator. She completed a master's degree in animation at the School of Film and New Media at Tokyo University of the Arts.
http://ayasacream.blogspot.jp/

KUNO Yoko　[Japan]
Born in 1990. Animation artist and manga artist. Graduating from the Department of Graphic Design at Tama Art University.
http://kunoyoko.tumblr.com/

MATSUMOTO Saki　[Japan]
Animator, animation director. Graduated Tokyo University of the Art, Graduate School of Film and New Media, Department of Animation.
http://37do.main.jp

SHIRAISHI Keiko　[Japan]
Born in Tokyo, 1985. Working as freelance animation artist and manga artist.
http://keikoshiraishi.com/

WAKAMI Arisa　[Japan]
Animation director. She made documentary animation on and directed various animated films.
http://www.arisawakami.com/

YAMADA Naoko　 [Japan]
Born in Kyoto. She joined Kyoto Animation in 2004. She directed “K-ON!”, “K-ON!!”, “K-ON! Movie”, “Tamako Market”, “The shape of voice”.

Related Event

■Opening Performance
Performer: Shinjuko
Date: Thursday 16th March 19:00－
Venue: Bildraum 07
Shinjuko will perform, including live drawings, at the opening event.

■Curator’s Talk “tenacious, gracious
Guest: KOUNO Fumiyo Moderator: OKAMOTO Mitsuko, Planning director
Date: Friday 17th March 15:30－
Venue: Bildraum 07”
Planning director Mitsuko Okamoto will talk about the tenacity and graciousness of Japanese women in the works of Fumiyo Kouno, considering the themes of each work, the people who are featured in them, anecdotes from the production process, and her distinctive ways of seeing and thinking.

■Workshop
Lecturer: Shinjuko
Date: Friday 17th March 18:00－ & 19:30－
Venue: Foyer, Metro Kinokulturhaus
Up to 8 participants each session
Shinjuko’s pictures have their roots in Japanese calligraphy. The workshop will introduce her novel script.

Co-organizer Event

■Special Screening: “In This Corner of the World”
Date: Thursday 16th March 21:00－　/ Sunday 19th March 11:30－
Venue: Metro Kinokulturhaus
tricky women is a festival of works by women but there will also be a special screening of “In This Corner of the World”, an animation by the male film director, Sunao Katabuchi.
*Greeting of KOUNO Fumiyo, Original author of Manga at the screening venue.

■Lecture: “In This Corner of the World”
Guest: KOUNO Fumiyo Moderator: Jaqueline Berndt, PhD, Kyoto Seika University
Date: Friday 17th March 13:00－15:00
Venue: Metro Kinokulturhaus
Professor Jaqueline Berndt of Kyoto Seika University talks with Fumiyo Kouno, author of the original “In This Corner of the World” manga.

Screening

■Japan Media Arts Festival curation program under the theme of “tenacious, gracious”

Date: Friday 17th March 　21:00-　/ Saturday 18th March 19:00-
Venue：Metro Kinokulturhaus
By means of animation, a medium divorced from physical, temporal and spatial constraints, women are seen to prance with true freedom across the screen. Their expressions are simultaneously those of innocent girls and mischievous little devils who love to play tricks on people. These are women with the power to draw on the diversity innate to them from birth and use it to respond more flexibly to whatever external situation they encounter. In this program, I tried to compile expressions of female existence as described by female writers living in Japan. I want viewers to appreciate this intensely feminine freedom to the full.
１ ”The Evening Traveling”, KONDOH Akino, 6th Animation Division Excellence Award (4'00")
２ “Papillon Yoshiko”, Shinjuko (3'25")
３ “YAMASUKI YAMAZAKI”, Shishi YAMAZAKI, 17th Animation Division Jury Selection (2'22")
４ “Summer’s Puke is Winter’s Delight”, KABUKI Sawako, Artist selected at 17th Animation Division Jury Selection (2'59")
５ “The Blooms”, KUGENUMA Ayasa (5'40")　
６ “Sunset Flower Blooming”, HU Yuanyuan, 16th Animation Division Jury Selection (10'19")
７ “Spring Sleeper”, MATSUMOTO Saki (2'04")
８ “Snow Hut”, MIZUSHIRI Yoriko,17th Animation Division Jury Selection (5'22")
９ “Airy me”, KUNO Yoko17th Animation Division New Face Award (5'38")
１０ “KiyaKiya”, KONDOH Akino, 16th Animation Division Jury Selection (6'39")
１１ “Hide-and-seek”, SHIRAISHI Keiko (7'52")
１２ “Birth 〜 Weaving life”, WAKAMI Arisa / ARAI Chie / KOGUMA Atsuko, Artist selected at 6th Animation Division Jury Selection (19'04")

Tamako love story

YAMADA Naoko

[2013 / Animated feature film / 18th Animation Division New Face Award]　

Date: Saturday 18th March 16:00-
Venue：Metro Kinokulturhaus

All third-year high school student KITASHIRAKAWA Tamako ever thinks about is mochi rice cakes. On the way home from school one day, Tamako talks with her friends about what they will do after graduation. While her friends are uncertain about their futures, Tamako is apathetic: She will take over her family's “mochi" shop. Just as she is starting to have premonitions of change around her, Tamako is told by her childhood friend OJI Mochizo that he will go to university in Tokyo. To Tamako, who has spent all her childhood side by side with Mochizo, this is unthinkable. And then Mochizo tells her that he loves her. The young girl is suddenly thrust down the path to becoming an adult by the appearance of love in her life. This tale of youth is a sequel to the animated TV series “Tamako Market”.　(83 min. 50 sec.)

Outline

Period：	Thursday, 16th to Thursday 23th March, 2017 Tue-Sat (13:00 – 18:00)　Sat. 18th March (11:00 – 16:00)
Venue：	Bildraum 07　（Burggasse 7-9, 1070 Wien, Austria） Opening at 18:30 on 16th March
Admission：	Free
Organizer：	Japan Media Arts Festival / Agency for Cultural Affairs, Government of Japan
Co-organizer：	tricky women 2017
Cooperation：	Gallery Bildraum 07
Planning Director：	OKAMOTO Mitsuko
Project Advisor：	FURUKAWA Taku (Animation artist) MOURI Yoshitaka （Professor, Graduate School of Global Arts, Tokyo University of the Arts）
Administration：	NHK International, Inc.

Overview

tricky women 2017

Period: Wednesday, 15th to Sunday 19th March, 2017
Venue: Metro Kinokulturhaus （Johannesgasse 4, 1010 Wien, Austria)

http://www.trickywomen.at/en

tricky women 2017, the fourteenth in the series, has a special focus on Japan. Three short animation programs by Japanese artists are featured in the festival’s animation program and the diverse attractions also include a workshop, lecture and live performance. The various Japan-related exhibitions include a special exhibition at two centrally located gallery organized as part of the Agency for Cultural Affairs’ program for Japan Media Arts Festival participation in overseas media arts festivals. Two Japanese artists have been nominated for the competition section. Mitsuko Okamoto, planning director at the exhibition will also serve on this year’s international film festival jury.