On September 6, our third Open Research Program featuring Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster was held in the Annex of the Museum of Kyoto. This event—which was presented as a “lecture” at the artist’s request, with as few details about its content as possible—was actually the fourth lecture/performance in the artist’s “M.2062” series, M.2062 (Scarlett).
In this series, which she began in 2012, Gonzalez-Foerster appears as different characters and personas and delivers lecture/performances using text and music. Her character in Kyoto was Scarlett O’Hara, the heroine of Gone with the Wind as performed in the 1939 film by Vivian Leigh, a selection that resonated beautifully with her backdrop: the Bank of Japan Kyoto Branch, built in 1906. Gonzalez-Foerster stood on the balcony on the second floor during the first half of the lecture/performance, and typed text as Scarlett O’Hara, which was projected onto a screen on the ground floor. During the second half, she came downstairs to speak, as her own self dressed as the character, about her memories and desires and the thought process that led to this work.
142 audience members were present for this lecture/performance. The Parasophia Office would like to thank the six students from Doshisha University, Kyoto Seika University, Kyoto Institute of Technology, and Osaka University who provided their assistance in this program, and contemporary artist Yasumasa Morimura for graciously loaning his Scarlett O’Hara costume and making other introductions without which the lecture/performance would not have been possible. A record of the lecture/performance is available in our Publications section as Parasophia Chronicle vol. 1 no. 3 (PDF and EPUB).

(Photos by Tadashi Hayashi)

Open Research Program 03 [Lecture/Performance] Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster “M.2062 (Scarlett)”
Date: Friday, September 6, 2013 7:00–8:00 PM
Venue: Annex Hall, The Museum of Kyoto
Presented by the Kyoto International Festival of Contemporary Culture Organizing Committee, Kyoto Association of Corporate Executives (Kyoto Keizai Doyukai), Kyoto Prefecture, and Kyoto City
With the cooperation of The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto
Under the auspices of The Japan Foundation

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About the Open Research Program
The Artistic Director and his curatorial team will conduct part of their research for Parasophia: Kyoto International Festival of Contemporary Culture 2015 publicly, in the form of lectures and other events in this program.