" NIGHT OF A THOUSAND STARS "
CONNECTIVITY THROUGH CINEMA WITH TOMONARI NISHIKAWA *IN PERSON*
Still from 45 7 Broadway, 2013
SUNDAY MAY 31, 2015 @ THE CENTER FOR PERFORMANCE RESEARCH
361 MANHATTAN AVENUE, BROOKLYN. OFF METROPOLITAN G OR LORIMER L
DOORS 7PM – SHOW at 7:30PM – $6 SUGGESTED DONATION – FILMS, DRINKS & DISCUSSION.
Total running time, 70 minutes. Additional time for discussion / Q & A with the artist
MONO NO AWARE is excited to present the work of Tomonari Nishikawa as part of the CONNECTIVITY THROUGH CINEMA screening series. In this extensive survey of his work, we’ll present early Super 8mm “sketch films” to gain a sense of his approach to form, then follow his work through complex 16mm multiple exposures in which Tomonari carefully re-defines the chaos of busy metropolitan walkways with subtle inter-image movements. The program will build up to his most recent and contemplative 35mm film work “sound of a million insects, light of a thousand stars”. All his films are a meditation on the forms within the frame. Where most filmmakers find the composition and capture it, Tomonari contemplates and activates it.
FULL PROGRAM:
Sketch Film #1 (2005, US, Super 8, silent, 18/24fps, b&w, approx. 3 min.)
Sketch Film #2 (2005, US, Super 8, silent, 18/24fps, b&w, 3 min.)
Sketch Film #3 (2006, US/Japan, Super 8, silent, 18/24fps, b&w, 3 min.)
Sketch Film #4 (2007, US, Super 8, silent, 18/24fps, color, 3 min.)
Sketch Film #5 (2007, US, Super 8, silent, 18/24fps, b&w, 3 min.)
As a painter carries a sketchbook, I carried a super 8 camera and did single-framing as an everyday exercise to sharpen my filmmaker’s eye, making animations by forms found in the public space, regarding the apparent shapes and movements. All films were edited in camera and hand-processed afterwards, except Sketch Film #4, which was shot on Kodachrome color film.
Market Street (2005, US, 16mm, silent, b&w, 5 min.)
I studied Sketch Film #1 and Sketch Film #2 as reference to make the film structure prior to shooting on Market Street in San Francisco. All shots were exposed on this street and the visual was carefully composed frame by frame. This project was commissioned by Exploratorium and San Francisco Arts Commission for the outdoor screening event, A Trip Down Market Street 1905/2005: An Outdoor Centennial Celebration.
Tokyo – Ebisu (2010, Japan, 16mm, sound, color, 5 min.)
JR (Japan Railway Company) Yamanote Line is one of the Japan’s busiest lines, consisting of 29 stations and running as a loop. The film shows the views from the platforms of 10 stations in Yamanote Line, from Tokyo Station to Ebisu Station clockwise. The in-camera visual effects and the layered soundtrack may exaggerate the sense of the actual locations, while suggesting the equipment that was used for capturing the audio and visual.
Shibuya – Tokyo (2010, Japan, 16mm, sound, color, 10 min.)
As a following sequence of Tokyo – Ebisu, this film shows the views around the exits of 20 stations in JR Yamanote Line, from Shibuya Station to Tokyo Station clockwise.
45 7 Broadway (2013, US, 16mm, sound, color, 5 min.)
This is about Times Square, the noises and movements at this most well-known intersection. The film was shot on black and white films through color filters, red, green, and blue, then shots were optically printed onto color films through these filters. The layered images of shots by handheld camera would agitate the scenes, and the advertisements on the digital billboards try to pull ahead of others.
sound of a million insects, light of a thousand stars(2014, Japan, 35mm, 1.37:1, sound, color, 2 min.)
I buried a 100-foot (about 30 meters) 35mm negative film under fallen leaves alongside a country road, which was about 25 km away from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, for about 6 hours, from the sunset of June 24, 2014, to the sunrise of the following day. The night was beautiful with a starry sky, and numerous summer insects were singing loud. The area was once an evacuation zone, but now people live there after the removal of the contaminated soil. This film was exposed to the possible remaining of the radioactive materials.
ABOUT TOMONARI NISHIKAWA:
Born in Nagoya, Japan. Nishikawa started filmmaking in the US, and his works has been screened at film festivals worldwide since 2003, including Berlinale, Edinburgh International Film Festival, Hong Kong International Film Festival, International Film Festival Rotterdam, London Film Festival, Media City Experimental Film and Video Festival, New York Film Festival, Singapore International Film Festival, and Toronto International Film Festival. His film, Market Street, which was commissioned by Exploratorium, received Film Award at EXiS: Experimental Film and Video Festival in Seoul, South Korea. In 2010, he showed a series of 8mm and 16mm films at MoMA P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, as part of the 2010 Greater New York Exhibition.
ARTIST STATEMENT:
I mainly work with moving image, making single channel films and videos for cinema and other works for expanded cinema, including installation and performance. Medium has an important role in my projects, as well as a format and filmmaking technique, and I choose a medium and technique according to a concept/idea of a project. All projects also show my interest in forms in art and the process of art making, which is also an important part of my projects, and some of them would bring up cultural/social issues, with image and sound captured in the public space. Recently, I have been more and more aware of an idea of filming as an act of documenting, and I consider some of my works documentary. – TN
MONO NO AWARE’S SCREENING SERIES:
The CONNECTIVITY THROUGH CINEMA series will present the work of artists, film-makers and curators who are traveling or presenting special interactive programs in-person. Our hope is to engage the community by showing work with a focus on post-screening discussion.
This event is sponsored, in part, by the Greater New York Arts Development Fund of the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, administered by Brooklyn Arts Council (BAC).
