Japan Foundation : The Japan Foundation Awards (2024)
The Japan Foundation (JF) is proud to announce the recipients of the Japan Foundation Awards 2024.
This year marks the 51st anniversary of the Japan Foundation Awards, which were launched in 1973, the year after the establishment of the Japan Foundation. For the past 50 years, the Foundation has presented the Japan Foundation Awards to individuals and organizations that have made significant contributions to promoting international mutual understanding and friendship between Japan and other countries through academic, artistic, and other cultural pursuits.
For 2024, the three recipients (Chiharu Shiota ; Association of Japanese Language Teachers of Mongolia ; The Sainsbury Institute for the Study of Japanese Arts and Cultures) have been selected after the screening of 60 candidates nominated by experts and the general public.
Chiharu Shiota
Berlin, 2023
Photo by Sunhi Mang
SHIOTA Chiharu is a Berlin-based artist who is active internationally.
Since making her debut she has consistently deepened her expression while confronting the fundamental theme of “life and death.” A work she produced while studying in Germany in 1997, in which she employed her own body as a component of the work and wrestled with mud, marked her starting point as an artist. “During Sleep,” which she unveiled at Switzerland’s Museum of Art Lucerne in 2002, was a work in which 30 hospital beds were placed in a space that was woven in black thread, to the point of almost blacking it out, and it presented a direct expression of “life and death”, including through a performance that involved the artist sleeping. In addition, upon visiting Berlin eight years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Shiota created “Inside – Outside” (2008), a work in which windows collected from demolished buildings and other locations were stacked up highly in a wall configuration. The structure, which makes it possible for viewers to gaze at one another while separated between ‘that side’ and ‘this side,’ recalls the history and narrative of humankind, which are marked by differing views.
Chiharu Shiota
The Key in the Hand, 2015
Installation: old keys, wooden boats, red wool
Japan Pavilion at 56th Venice Biennale, Venice, Italy
Photo by Sunhi Mang
(c)JASPAR, Tokyo, 2024 and Chiharu Shiota
Through installations conveying powerful messages such as this, she began presenting her works in various German cities while studying at the Berlin University of the Arts from 1999, and the sphere of her activities steadily widened to include Europe, the US and Asia. Since taking part in the International Biennial of Contemporary Art of Seville in 2004 she has also participated in international exhibitions on almost an annual basis. Among those exhibitions, “The Key in the Hand,” a work that she presented at the Japan Pavilion of the International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia, was composed by tied keys that had been gathered from people around the world with a mass of red threads that fully covered the space. Along with the intense visual impact created by the work, which resembled a blaze that had erupted, many of those who saw it were charmed by its masterful expression of unified memories, in the form of people’s wishes and thoughts lying hidden in the work’s 180,000 keys.
Having made her way to Berlin from Japan on her own, Shiota has established a solid position as a Japanese artist living in Germany. The entire world forms a stage for her creations, and those activities themselves put international exchange into practice. Simultaneously, she has also emerged as a major driving force encouraging women to flourish internationally. Against the backdrop of this remarkable track record, we expect Shiota to continue to make great strides in the future also, and accordingly, we believe she is a worthy recipient of the Japan Foundation Award.
Article published on https://www.jpf.go.jp/