Mukai studies and creates work centered on the themes of “queerness” and “archives.” For their fellowship, they investigate how queerness is received and represented in New York’s contemporary music and art scenes and explore queer music practices in academic settings. Mukai explores themes of gender and queerness through music theater projects rooted in documentary storytelling. Through interactions with drag performers, queer artists, activists, professors, and composers in New York, Mukai aims to reflect on their own creative work while redefining the concepts and practices of queer art and building a new queer cultural archive. 
Photo by Ayane Shindo

Profile  Wataru MUKAI 
Mukai is a composer, performer and scholar whose work spans a wide range from Japanese traditional music to orchestral compositions. In recent years, they have been developing their practice around the themes of gender, queerness, and activism. Mukai received the 33rd Yasushi Akutagawa Suntory Composition Award with "Dancing Queer - for orchestra" in 2023.
After graduating at the top of his class from the Composition Department of the Tokyo University of the Arts, they traveled to Germany while enrolled in the university's graduate program. He pursued further studies in the Composition Master's Program at the Mannheim University of Music and Performing Arts and in the Théâtre musical Master's Program at the Bern University of the Arts. They completed doctoral studies at Anton Bruckner Private University and are now pursuing doctoral research at Tokyo University of the Arts.