September 16, 2023 -  December 17, 2023

Towada Art Center will hold a solo exhibition of the artist Mino Arata (ACC 2021 NY Fellow) at its satellite venue space from September 16 to December 17, 2023. With a background in theater and photography, the transdisciplinary artist Mino Arata writes scripts based on the histories and memories that lie dormant in a place or landscape, which he then stages in the form of performances and installations. Long interested in the issue of United States military bases in Japan, Mino has previously created work about Okinawa, where around 70 percent of US military bases in the country are located. This exhibition features his new script, Till Things Are Quiet, which he wrote based on research conducted in Misawa, Aomori, home to a US air force base. In his earlier To/From Kuba, Mino explored the problems related to an artist living in Tokyo’s right to address Okinawa in their work. Last year, he spent six months in New York doing research for a work dealing from a more macro perspective with how we live with a sense of impending war. Inhabiting as we do in an increasingly uncertain world, Mino’s new work calls on us to confront what is sleeping under the surface of our minds. The exhibition comprises a series of installations at several sites, including Towada Art Center’s satellite venue space and other locations around the city. It employs an experimental approach by which the script is spread across the various venues. Visitors move from venue to venue, reading the different parts of the script and gradually experiencing the whole work.

The script is available to read here.

Exhibitions at Satellite Venue space
In 2022, the Towada Art Center began repurposing the artwork space—an empty building transformed into an exhibition room by the art collective 目 [mé]—to serve as a satellite venue. Located on the second floor, the white cube gallery of space stands in stark contrast with its surroundings and is now used to showcase the experimental work of emerging artists.

Photo: Mino Arata, Design: Ishizuka Shun