Street Museum 2022 | TOKYO MIDTOWN

"Midtown × Street × Art."

Enjoying art is not limited to inside the museums. The "Street Museum" has taken art on the street of Tokyo Midtown.
The TOKYO MIDTOWN AWARD is a design and art competition that Tokyo Midtown holds every year with the aim of discovering and supporting upcoming talented artists and designers and sowing the seeds for future collaborations.
This exhibition brings back the six group of winners of the TOKYO MIDTOWN AWARD 2021 art competition together at Tokyo Midtown.
In this turbulent era of rapid changes in lifestyles and communication,
the artists focused on the invisible mechanisms and entities that shape ourselves and society,
and pursued them from their own perspectives.Please take a look at aspects of "now" highlighted by young emerging artists.

#streetmuseum2022#midtownaward

Information

Exhibitors	Winners of the 2021 TOKYO MIDTOWN AWARD art competition Thumbelina（Yuta Niwa + Takanori Shimodera）, Shiori Sakamoto, Riho Kusaji, Yunyi Cai, Mao Shibata, Takahiro Tsuzuki

Period	March 18 Fri. – May 29 Sun, 2022
Time	6:30 to 24:30（Plaza B1's opening hours）
Fee	Free

Venue:	Metro Avenue, Plaza B1, Tokyo Midtown
Organizer:	Tokyo Midtown

Map

Electric Cine ClubThumbelina（Yuta Niwa +
Takanori Shimodera）
You Know Them,
But You Don't Know Them.Riho Kusaji
The Castle Inside OutYunyi Cai
Me and Tokyo Midtown.Shiori Sakamoto
Landscape Paintings of
Dirt and StainsTakahiro Tsuzuki
Blue tileMao Shibata

Electric Cine Club

Thumbelina
（Yuta Niwa + Takanori Shimodera）

A projection cart inspired by a movie projector and a gun turret, Electric Cine Club can go anywhere and everywhere and transform a space it into a theater. Unbound by place, it evokes the days before there were any cinemas. Projected from it, "Something Black" is an animation reminiscent of an Edo catfish painting. What is it thinking as it wriggles about? When Electric Cine Club comes to town and shows "Something Black," ordinary life gets an extraordinary makeover.

[Materials] Wood, iron, acrylic, wheels

Highlights

Electric Cine Club projects a black ink animation. What is the black creature thinking as it wriggles about? Right there and then, your ordinary life will get an extraordinary makeover.

Thumbelina (Yuta Niwa + Takanori Shimodera)

This unit consisting of artist Yuta Niwa and food stall researcher Takanori Shimodera was formed in 2021. Exhibitions they've been involved in:

2019: "Kataoka Mami Curation 'KUAD ANNUAL 2019 Spacecraft Earth'" (Former Kyoto University of Art & Design/Tokyo)
2021: "Yambaru Art Festival 2020-2021 Yambaru-Chishin" (Yambaru Art Festival Executive Committee/Okinawa)
2021: "If there were no Japanese painting in Japan" (Ueno Park/Tokyo)
2021: Grand Prize in the TOKYO MIDTOWN AWARD 2021 art competition

WEB: http://www.yutaniwa.com（Yuta Niwa）
https://www.taiya.asia（Takanori Shimodera）

You Know Them, But You Don't Know Them.

　Riho Kusaji

The silkworms that make the silk yarn in seats were domesticated more than 5,000 years ago, and have been genetically modified many times up to the present day.
I think of the genetic modifications behind development and production as bugs in the genes' proper history.
Just like how we can't see the back of a chair when we're sitting on it, we rarely think about things' backgrounds when we're using them.
In Europe, they replace the cloth on old chairs and keep using them for decades.
That culture of repairing things and continuing to value and use them rather than constantly making new ones really struck a chord with me, so I used it in my work.

[Materials] Chair, silk yarn, retroreflective yarn, acidic dye

Highlights

The retroreflective Material I used with the silk yarn is used for road signs and the like, and means calling for attention. The work changes depending on the viewing angle and lighting, and glows in photos taken with a flash.

Riho Kusaji

Born in 1997. From Hiroshima City, Hiroshima Prefecture. Lives in Hiroshima City, Hiroshima Prefecture.

2020: Graduated from the Department of Design and Applied Arts, Faculty of Arts, Hiroshima City University.
2022: Completed Graduate School of Arts, Hiroshima City University.
2018: "Forest of Textiles" Exhibition (Hiroshima City University/Hiroshima)
2021: "12th Hiroshima Society for Science of Arts Exhibition: Creation and Thought" (Hiroshima Society for Science of Arts/Hiroshima)
2021: Excellent Prize in the TOKYO MIDTOWN AWARD 2021 art competition

WEB: https://riho-kusaji.silk.to

The Castle Inside Out

Yunyi Cai

"I went inside the large castle. The first floor was a black room where people danced and live events were held, and the second floor was a large, white, empty hall. I went down some winding stairs to the basement, and found myself in terrifying darkness. When I escaped from the castle, I found a cardboard box on the road. Inside, there were three white cats scampering about. I was really unsure about whether I could rescue them. When I momentarily awoke from the dream then went back to it, a voice was saying, 'Why didn't you feed the cats? You forgot, didn't you!' The cats made noises like they were dying. Peeking inside the box again, I saw three angels...

Like Dante's Divine Comedy, a building consisting of three levels—The hell, purgatory (this world), and Paradise—had unfolded from the perspective of someone wandering around inside it."

[Materials] Canvas, wooden frames, oil paints, old paper, wax, wood panels, prefabricated frames, pins, paper mulberry, etc.

Highlights

Displaying both the finished work and its original sketches and text means viewers can enjoy both the finished and unfinished parts of the painting.

Yunyi Cai

Born in 1995. From Shanghai. Lives in Kokubunji City, Tokyo.

2022: 2nd year doctoral student in Studies in Production of Art, Doctoral Degree Program, Musashino Art University.
2019: "The Vision of a Lamb" Exhibition (Kiyoshi Art Space/Roppongi, Tokyo)
2021: "Taiyo Exhibition" (Galerie Nichido/Ginza, Tokyo)
2021: "People in landscape" Exhibition (Totem Pole Photo Gallery/Shinjuku, Tokyo)
2021: Ueno Royal Museum Grand Prize Exhibition (Ueno Royal Museum/Tokyo)
2021: Shell Art Exhibition (The National Art Center, Tokyo/Tokyo)
2021: Excellence Prize in the TOKYO MIDTOWN AWARD 2021 art competition

WEB: https://claricecai.tumblr.com/

Me and Tokyo Midtown.

Shiori Sakamoto

Tokyo Midtown is cool.
For me living far away, it's somewhere I long to be.

By a strange turn of events, a picture by me—a DIY store assistant—was exhibited in that same Tokyo Midtown.
That was last October,

but I still can't believe it even now.
I'm just truly grateful

for that miraculous connection between Tokyo Midtown and me.
It's prompted me to look for things I share with the place.

I sketched things that are both in my DIY store and in Tokyo Midtown as well.
You can find them all in Midtown.

[Materials] Pen and ink on paper, rope and wood

Highlights

I sketched things that are both in my DIY store and in Tokyo Midtown as well.
You can find them all in Midtown.

Shiori Sakamoto

Born in 1997. From Kumagaya City, Saitama Prefecture. Lives in Ome City, Tokyo.

2020: Graduated from the Department of Scenography, Display and Fashion Design, College of Art and Design, Musashino Art University.
2021: Excellent Prize, Judges’ Special Prize in the TOKYO MIDTOWN AWARD 2021 art competition

WEB: http://happa.club

Landscape Paintings of Dirt and Stains

Takahiro Tsuzuki

Even the clean corners of town are home to old walls bearing countless layers of stains, dust, damage, and dirt. They're extremely expressive, as if some artist had created them with layer upon layer of paint.
As you gaze at all the accidental grime, blurry pictures of the history of the city and the people who live there will overlay it, and landscape paintings of dirt and stains will appear.

In the midst of dizzying change, picture the landscapes of the past, present, and future in the dirt on the walls of Roppongi, Akasaka, and Nogizaka—towns where buildings old and new jostle side by side.

[Materials] UV ink, concrete blocks, exterior wall panels, tube pipes, flat bars, etc.

Highlights

These are landscape paintings of dirt and stains I found within 10 minutes' walk of this place. How about letting the location info take you on a "dirt landscapes" stroll to see them?

Takahiro Tsuzuki

Born in 1988. From Tsurugashima City, Saitama Prefecture. Lives in Katsushika City, Tokyo.

2010: Graduated from the School of International Liberal Arts and Sciences, Waseda University.
2014: Graduated from the Department of Image Creation, Asagaya College of Art and Design.
2017: "Kosudo Art Project" (Kosudo Community Council/Niigata City, Niigata Prefecture)
2018～2019: "Paintings of Dirt and Stains" (Artist-in-residence exhibition) (Tainan City, Taiwan/Tainan City, Taiwan)
2020: "Plywood city" (Solo exhibition) (SYP gallery/Shinjuku, Tokyo)
2021: Excellence Prize in the TOKYO MIDTOWN AWARD 2021 art competition

WEB: https://tsuzukitakahiro.tumblr.com

Blue tile

Mao Shibata

Tokyo Midtown contains lots of artificial "natural objects" that've been deliberately made. For example, there's a wall that consists of layers stacked like bark on a green print that's like sunlight dappling through foliage. A new non-natural object is going to be placed amid these artificial "living things." A blue sculpture will stretch across the wall, with a monitor displaying real time chroma key composite images of the people passing in front of it, together with things that aren't there. The work will express the discomfort felt between the artificial natural objects and the bodies casually coming and going among them.

[Materials] Webcam, monitor, expanded polystyrene, fabric

Highlights

Please try standing in front of the camera, and feel the communication between the work in front of you and yourself looking at it.

Mao Shibata

Born in 1998. From Yokohama City, Kanagawa Prefecture. Lives in Tama City, Tokyo.

2022: Graduated from the Department of Sculpture, Faculty of Art and Design, Tama Art University.
2022: 1th year in the Graduate School of Sculpture, Tokyo University of the Arts.
2020: "Visible Things That Can Be Seen from Invisible Things" (Metal Laboratory, Department of Sculpture, Faculty of Fine Arts, Tokyo University of the Arts/Tennoz Central Tower, Tokyo)
2020: "XR Collection & Museum" (NTT DOCOMO, INC., Odakyu Electric Railway Co., Ltd./Odakyu Shinjuku Station, Tokyo)
2021: "Teshikaga Extreme Cold Art Festival 2021" (Extreme Cold Art Festival & Inn / Kawayu Onsen, Teshikaga Town, Hokkaido)
2021: Excellence Prize in the TOKYO MIDTOWN AWARD 2021 art competition

WEB: Twitter：https://twitter.com/ginnnnn
Instagram：https://www.instagram.com/oooolililoooo/

Call for entries for the TOKYO MIDTOWN AWARD 2022

Tokyo Midtown is now calling for entries for the 15th TOKYO MIDTOWN AWARD, a design and art competition to discover and support the next generation of creators.
In addition to the prizes, winners are given long-term supports and collaborative opportunities with Tokyo Midtown including participation in the Street Museum exibition.
- Official site
- @midtown_award