MISAKO & ROSEN is pleased to announce our second solo exhibition with artist Yuki Okumura. Okumura, a graduate of the MFA program of the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music (2004) is based in Tokyo and is a frequent participant in international residency programs including, that of the Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin as well as the Laboratorie Village Nomade, La Corbiere, Switzerland and Taipei Artist Village. In 2007, MISAKO & ROSEN presented a two-person exhibition with Okumura and WIll Rogan. In 2009, Okumura participated in the group exhibitions “Now That I’m By Myself,” She Says,” I’m Not By Myself, Which is Good” at Diverse Works, Houston, Texas, “Touch the World”, Borderless Art Museum, Shiga, “ Love Love Show”, Aomori Museum of Art, Aomori.

Okumura’s upcoming exhibition represents an elaboration of his ongoing series “Anatomy FIction” which focuses on the body as and its place with in the context of representation and perception. The exhibition will open with a performance by rakugo (storyteller) Riko Shofukute based upon a classic Japanese story selected by Okumura. Shofukute will transform the original into a rakugo performance. The performance will be filmed and the resulting video, stage and related works will be presented for the remainder of the exhibition.

Speaking of this new work, Okumura stated :
On “Anatomy Fiction – rakugo version” Yuki Okumura
For this exhibition, I decided to deal with a Japanese old tale that has stuck in my mind since I saw it as an animation on TV when I was very small.
In this old tale, objects of physical perception shift from high up in the sky to deep inside the subject’s own body, based on an anatomical structure that is totally impossible in reality. One of the reasons why this story struck me was, perhaps, I could feel that it might be “possible” based on my daily physical experiences with my own body as a child. I had never seen my real anatomical structure then (not yet still now though), nor an anatomical chart, so it felt more realistic than you can imagine.
By the way, rakugo has numerous stories dealing with such fictional anatomical structures, such as “Dog’s Eyes”, “Mt. Head”, and “Lantern Head”. In rakugo, what is in front of your eyes is merely a sole body fixed onto a zabuto cushion. This form itself may be pretty suitable to represent things that are only possible in words (stories). Rakugo can depict any kind of body structures so vividly, as long as we can take it as “possible” when referring to our everyday sensation.
If so, what will it be like if transferring this old tale into a rakugo story? Taking this idea as a starting point, this project started. There was a great encounter with a rakugo performer Riko Shofukutei along the way. I hope this work will not only bring lots of laughter but also reveal how our firsthand concept of human body structure is loose and variable.