[Yayako Uchida x Hiromi Kurosawa] A work that gets "likes" from everyone is an illusion. What art can do in an age of excessive explanation

Yayako Uchida is a writer. She has been attracted to art since she was a child, and through her mother, Kirin Kiki, she has had contact with many artists. She currently narrates the program "no art, no life" (NHK Educational TV), which introduces artists who create original works of art. In June 2024, she will be appointed co-director of the Mugonkan Museum, a memorial museum for fallen art students in Nagano Prefecture.

Following on from the first part, Yayako Uchida and Hiromi Kurosawa, chief curator at the 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa and advisor to HERALBONY, will philosophize about the word "art."

>>Click here for the first part: Rather than "understanding," it's "touching" you. How to approach art that plays with your body and soul

"This is not art"? Why draw the line?

Uchida Yayako (hereinafter, Uchida) : Since I was a child, my mother took me to various art museums, but the first art museum I paid for and went to was the Swiss Art Brut Collection (※) when I was in high school.

(*Art Brut Collection: A museum of "Art Brut," art created by people who have not received special artistic training and who are not bound by preconceived notions of technique or style. It also includes works by artists with disabilities.)

At the time, I didn't know much about what "Art Brut" was. I had chosen an art course in high school, and my teacher recommended going there on a holiday, but I was blown away by the incredible energy of the works there. Perhaps because I was in the most impressionable period of my adolescence, I was inspired by the shapes, colors, materials, and all the expressions. After that, I started going there many times on weekends. So for me, it wasn't that I had discovered "art by artists with disabilities," but rather that it was an experience of encountering something incredible, and it stuck with me.

However, when I was asked to narrate "no art, no life," I told my friend, who told me, "I don't think of that as art, and I'm not interested in it," which shocked me. My friend had graduated from a prestigious art school in the United States, so perhaps he thought that only people who had received a certain level of art education were artists. However, I was shocked to learn that there exists a value system that says that something that gives you a sense of beauty and energy beyond your imagination, something that you undoubtedly thought of as "art," is not art. Even now, I can't answer how I should have responded to my friend.

Hiromi Kurosawa (hereafter Kurosawa) : I see. First of all, personal likes and dislikes are different from the issue of boundaries in society. Preferences are a matter of personal freedom. If Uchida's friend meant that she "doesn't really like it," then it would be strange to press her by asking "why don't you understand the good points of this work?" It's just a matter of "I see, you don't like it. I like it . " But perhaps what's bothering Uchida is that she sensed a different nuance in her friend's words than the issue of likes and dislikes.

Uchida : That's right. The implication was that people who have no artistic training don't consider genres such as art brut or outsider art to be art, so I was wondering why there is such a boundary between "this is art and this is not art."

A circle that utilizes technique and a circle that is like breathing

Kurosawa : Perhaps your friend places importance on the presence or absence of technique, the ability to control one's own expression through repeated training. Students studying art at universities and other educational institutions draw sketches every day to hone their skills and improve their ability to depict one thing and draw what they want to draw. On the other hand, like the example of Tadanori Yokoo mentioned in the first part -- Yokoo has undergone repeated training and acquired high level of technique -- there are people who express themselves with a particular will to "have to draw this" and with a naturalness that is as natural as breathing. Some people may be sensitive to this difference.

Uchida : I see. But how does that differ when you look at the results of your expression? For example, a circle drawn in one stroke after much dedication, devising a composition and design, and finally arriving at the result you want to draw, and a circle drawn today by someone who continues to draw the same circle every day. Can you compare the two circles and decide which one is better? I think they're both precious without even needing to be compared.

Kurosawa : You can compare the two circles and ask yourself, "Which do you like better?" But you can't draw a line between what is good and what is bad, or what is worthy of being art, when it comes to the activities of the people who have been facing those circles . ... I think your friend will understand if you explain it carefully .

Uchida : I was so shocked at the time that I went home feeling down (laughs). But you're absolutely right. People are free to like and dislike things. It's interesting because there are differences. A world where everyone looks at the same thing and says "this is nice" is an illusion and boring.

Kurosawa : Enjoy and respect differences. Some artists have strong opinions about their differences. Some artists happen to not be called disabled or have not been diagnosed with a disability. Even if you knew that, would it have any impact on watching their works?

It is we, the curators, who must be careful when communicating about the work. For example, the more we try to explain the work, the more we may end up forcing the artist or the work into a certain framework. If you create an exhibition with the intention of breaking down existing groupings, but you give the exhibition a common label, you will end up grouping it twice. Is it possible that someone who wants to eliminate gender boundaries will take up a female artist and name it a "female artist special feature"? Aren't they just creating a level of inconvenience by making it look like they are communicating something? I think we need to think about this more carefully.

No matter what I do, I can't take it off

Uchida : Mr. Kurosawa, you were a judge for the international art award "HERALBONY Art Prize 2024" held this year. I heard that there were nearly 2,000 entries. What perspective do you use when selecting works?

Kurosawa : I thought a lot about what was expected of me as a judge. To begin with, the job of a museum curator is to rank works not based on what you like or dislike, but on whether or not they should be preserved for the future. Museums are places where works are collected and handed down to future generations. There is a limit to the number of works that can be preserved and managed, so you have to decide which works to keep and which not, in other words, which works are worthy of being preserved for the future . This is the most difficult and cruel part.

Since the HERALBONY Art Prize 2024 was a newly established award, the judging process will set the standards for future awards. Of course, it is impossible to rank the efforts of the people who have worked on these works. Still, we must make a selection.

Uchida : It's a huge responsibility.

Kurosawa : I broke out in a bit of an unpleasant sweat (laughs). The work I ultimately chose for the Special Jury Prize had a slightly different "perspective" from the others.

It uses photographs, and nowadays, because everyone can easily take photos with their smartphones, there are a huge number of works being produced in the world. Even so, this work, with a slightly different perspective, made me think, "It would be interesting if the city looked like that."

Uchida : Were there many judges?

Kurosawa : There were four people in the second round of auditions.

Uchida : Wow! Only four people! That's a big responsibility. Did all the judges share the same criteria for choosing?

Kurosawa : They were all different. Katsuhiko Hibino, the president of Tokyo University of the Arts, is also an artist himself, so he chose works that he thought would be something he would like to create.

Uchida : Wow. That's interesting. When judging, Ms. Kurosawa had been asking herself, "What is expected of me?" but ultimately she came to the conclusion that "I just need to choose something that moves me, that I think is interesting from a different perspective than what I've seen before."

Kurosawa : Yes. It took me a bit of wandering before I got there (laughs). But I can't get rid of "myself." It's not just my title, it's everything I've been through day by day that makes up "myself."

"Art is a mirror" and "Art is tolerant"

Uchida : Art is like a mirror, and the more you look at a work of art, the more you can see inside yourself. If you go further, the mirror may become a window or a door, leading to another world. As Mr. Kurosawa mentioned in the first part, paintings and sculptures in particular have colors, shapes, and objects because they cannot be put into words. By using the peephole of art, we may be able to escape reality in a good way from this world where everything tends to be over-explained, look down on our own activities, or even take a peek inside.

When you think about it that way, HERALBONY is a hard company, but at the same time, its contours are not clearly defined, but rather it gives the impression of being constantly flickering and fluttering.

Kurosawa : I think art should be tolerant. It accepts the idea of ​​just trying things out. There's no mistake. The way we frame it as "disability and art" is just one part of HERALBONY, and I think its essence is that we are a group that is working to increase the level of tolerance in society . What we should aim for is for people to think that HERALBONY is something that "might change society a little."

Uchida : I was somehow very happy to see that Mr. Kurosawa, whose job requires him to categorize and assign values ​​to things, has such a free-spirited view of art.

Kurosawa : It may sound presumptuous to say this, but when you work as a curator at a museum for a long time, you come to understand a lot of the work . But with HERALBONY, there are so many things I don't understand. And that's what makes it so fun!

Uchida : Not knowing is troublesome, but it's actually very attractive. Rather than moving straight towards a clear goal, they tolerate ambiguity and uncertainty, surrender to interesting and attractive things, and willingly take detours. That's the path HERALBONY is taking, and I think it would be great if I could get involved in some way along the way.