Soon after the venue opened, a small figure appeared silhouetted on the second floor of the Museum of Kyoto’s Annex Hall, above a large screen about three meters wide and two meters high at the front of the room, and danced a slow shuffling dance. Although there was no music playing, the awkward dancing continued, looking like simply movement for movement’s sake. At 5:00 PM when the event was scheduled to begin, a spotlight lit the figure and people’s attention focused, but nothing changed. For five more minutes we watched the listless dancing of the speaker, Tatsuo Majima, in a somewhat perplexed silence broken two or three times by muffled laughter.

This was the third in a series of four Open Research Programs featuring Tatsuo Majima, the artist who was also scheduled to exhibit work at Parasophia: Kyoto International Festival of Contemporary Culture 2015. The “two-hour presentation” began with an installment of his “Today’s Dance” series, ongoing since 2012, and went on to cover Majima’s own works listed in the event title. His own presentation of himself was the main theme of this event.

The original intent of this Open Research Program series was to show some of Majima’s thought process. The first in the series focused on “art,” the second “museums.” This time the theme was “Tatsuo Majima,” and the fourth theme is to be “Kyoto.” Each time, two hours of Majima’s rapid-fire delivery adds up to what would probably be well over a couple thousand words if typed up. Listening attentively to these arduous presentations, one finds they are a thorough and accessible doorway into Majima’s thinking, wherein the themes of opening and closing, tying and untying, are reiterated over and over with different meanings and contexts. There is no predictable path from introduction to development, twist, and conclusion, and as the overall series title “Series Title Under Consideration” indicates, there is fundamentally no orderly progress toward a predetermined goal. Instead he is sharing raw information with people gathered at the venue, delivering insights from the fringe through his fast yet exploratory patter.

At the end, he spoke about his own work that will be exhibited at Parasophia. He looked back on his own activities since the 1990s, thoroughly outlining his work in a manner that conveyed his thought process to the audience, and gave glimpses of the landscape of his next project. The two-hour presentation by Majima, who has carried out years of research into Japanese modern art and carved out a unique position within it for himself, went into overtime and ticked toward the three-hour mark. Some audience members were getting drowsy, but the fast-paced talk went on unabated. The depth and breadth of Tatsuo Majima’s mind know no limits.

Video recording (in Japanese only) scheduled to be published on www.youtube.com/user/parasophiaVideos

The fourth and final lecture in this series will be held on Saturday, January 17, 2015 with the title “Piled-Up Mud/Mud Jutting Out: (Two-Hour Diagram On) Kyoto, Parasophia, Ryusei Kishida, and Manchuria”. This lecture series has been organized with the cooperation of Mr. Jun Asami.

Open Research Program 10 [Lecture Series] Tatsuo Majima “Series Title Under Consideration” (3) “Buntenteitenkaisoteitenshinbuntennitteeen (Tentative), Beijing Diary, Kugenuma Sumo/Kyoto Boxing, Japanese Modern Art/The Cheerful Country: (Two-Hour Presentation On) Works by Tatsuo Majima”
Date: Wednesday, November 19, 2014 5:00–7:00 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 TARO NASU

More information

Open Research Program [Lecture Series] Tatsuo Majima “Series Title Under Consideration”
(1) “Open and Close, Close and Open, Open and Fold, Fold and Unfold: (Two-Hour Lecture On) Japanese Modern and Contemporary Art” - July 19 (Sat.), 2014
(2) “To Whom Does Publicness Belong: (Two-Hour Lecture On) Art Museums, International Exhibitions, Contemporary Art, and Art” - Sept. 21 (Sun.), 2014
(3) “Buntenteitenkaisoteitenshinbuntennitteeen (Tentative), Beijing Diary, Kugenuma Sumo/Kyoto Boxing, Japanese Modern Art/The Cheerful Country: (Two-Hour Presentation On) Works by Tatsuo Majima” - November 19 (Wed.), 2014
(4) “Piled-Up Mud/Mud Jutting Out: (Two-Hour Diagram On) Kyoto, Parasophia, Ryusei Kishida, and Manchuria” - January 17 (Sat.), 2015

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.