The power of art created through shared experience!

Tsubasa Kato (1984-) is a Japanese contemporary artist who produces video, photographic and other works involving performances in which multiple participants are prompted to engage in collaborations. He is highly acclaimed for the numerous studies and projects he has conducted around the globe.

The Lighthouses – 11.3 PROJECT (2011)

One of Kato's major projects is his Pull and Raise series in which people gather and pool their wisdom to raise up or bring down huge structures with nothing but ropes and manpower. For The Lighthouses – 11.3 PROJECT, about five hundred people in Iwaki City, Fukushima Prefecture gathered together on 3 November, 2011—a public holiday in Japan, significant here because 11.3 is the numerical inversion of 3.11, the date of the Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami on 11 March of the same year. Using only ropes, they raised a structure built in the shape of a lighthouse using wood recovered from the debris of homes destroyed by the tsunami. The concept for this project has since inspired festivals in localities working to recover from the disaster.
With local communities on the verge of breaking up due to issues such as natural disasters, urban development, and environmental destruction, Kato's work demonstrates the importance of people spontaneously coming together and participating in accomplishing something. In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic and concerns throughout the world regarding the polarization of people and countries, Kato gives us a renewed awareness of what can be achieved through collaboration and solidarity transcending division and conflict.

Experience the thrill of the artist's best-known projects and high-profile works

The show presents a comprehensive view of the artist Tsubasa Kato and the development of his work, comprising 28 video works since 2007, including his best-known projects and high-profile works, such as Listen to the Same Wall (2015), Underground Orchestra (2017), (2017), 2679 (2019), and Superstring Secrets: Tokyo (2020), as well as photos and models.
Through dynamic installations and a mixture of sounds that make viewers feel as if they are actually there on location, the artist's wide variety of projects held in Japan, America, Mexico, Malaysia, Hong Kong, and other places throughout the world promise to provide a thrilling viewer experience that stimulates the imagination and transcends space and time.

Aiming for an inclusive society after the pandemic

This show, Kato's first solo exhibition at an art museum, coincides with the Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics that had been postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In the midst of all the disparities and divisions exposed by the pandemic, such as issues regarding vaccine types and availability, public opinion in Japan has been divided regarding holding the Olympics and Paralympics, something that is normally supposed to nurture a sense of unity and solidarity in the host country. It is our hope that this exhibition provides a small hint for how to resolve situations in which there are different opinions and perspectives to be taken into account before we can move forward.