Artist Profiles

• evala (See by Your Ears)

  

  evala lives in Tokyo, where he was born in 1976. He is a musician and sound artist who has released works of cutting-edge electronic music in Japan and abroad.
  In 2016 he launched the project “See by Your Ears”, which uses stereophonic systems as a new instrument to create novel audiovisual experiences. evala presents a fresh technique of “spatial composition” that constructs phenomena where sound behaves dynamically like a living thing. His major works include “Octyon Megalotis (Sonar+D, Barcelona 2017) and “Our Muse” (ACC, Gwangju Korea 2018), as well as “Acoustic Vessel Odyssey”, a 576-channel sound installation featuring Sony Sonic Surf VR stereophonic technology (SXSW, Austin 2018). evala also does sound production using the latest technology for stage performances, cinema, and public spaces.
  http://evala.jp

  "Anechoic Sphere"

  

  A sound installation meant to be experienced individually inside a small, dark anechoic chamber that brings about the new audiovisual sensation of “seeing by your ears”.
  https://youtu.be/rXfNEeOIxhY

  "Audio Vessel Odyssey"

  

  An audio vessel where visitors take a journey through space and time using sound from 576 speakers built around Sony’s Sonic Surf VR technology.

• Akio Suzuki

  

  Born in 1941 in Pyongyang. Since his infamous “Throwing Objects Down a Staircase” event at Nagoya Station in 1963 and the self-study events which followed, where he explored the processes of “projection” and “following” in the natural world, Suzuki has pursued listening as a practice. In the 1970s he created and began performing on a number of original instruments, including the echo instrument Analapos. In 1988 he performed his piece “Space in the Sun”, which involved purifying his ears for twenty-four hours in nature on the meridian line that runs through Amino, Kyoto. In 1996, he began his “o to da te” project where he seeks out echo points in the urban environment. Has performed and exhibited at many venues and music festivals around the world, including Documenta8 (Germany, 1987), the British Museum (2002), Musée Zadkine (France, 2004), Kunstmuseum Bonn (Germany, 2018), Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo(Tokyo, 2019), etc.
  https://www.akiosuzuki.com

  "Space for Basking in the Sun"

  

  A sound project for spending the day listening to nature on the Autumnal Equinox Holiday in a spot where the standard time meridiene passes through.

  "Otodate"

  

  An experience in listening to various sounds by standing on ear-shaped footpring marks. Part of the collection at the Musuem of Contemporary Art Tokyo and other galleries around the world.

Features

• evala: Tea ceremoy “Kancho-ro” sound installation
  a new work in the “Anechoic Sphere”series

  

  A sound installation by evala in the oldest extant tea ceremony house in Japan that persists since the days of the Edo Period. This piece is part of evala’s acclaimed “Anechoic Sphere” series in which audiences feel their bodies caressed by stereophonic sound in a dark anechoic chamber.
  Sounds that evala recorded from around the park and the Setouchi Island Sea fills the small tea room and gradually transforms and leads listeners to a new dimension of audio. *evala will also place speakers around the park as an outdoor sound installation that creates a mysterious world of sound.

• Akio Suzuki’s “Otodate” (new work) -Awakening “sounds” in a Japanese garden -

  

  Suzuki’s iconic “Otodate” that has toured the world will be featured at several locations in the gardens of Nakazu Banshou-en.
  This hands-on piece has viewers follow the footprint-like ear markings drawn on the ground throughout the park that when stood upon allow listeners to hear different sounds. By standing upon the “Otodate” as they find them while enjoying the garden, visitors can hone their senses of sight and hearing, thus creating scenery that is all their own.
  *Suzuki will also have other new work on display in the park and museum.

• A fusion of cutting-edge sound art and Japanese gardens

  

  With over 1,500 wakamatsu pine tress, an enormous kasamatsu over 600 years old, and an island encircling pond desinged to resemble the eight view of Omi from Lake Biwa, Nakazu Banshou-en is a space for enjoying a diverse selection of beautiful sights and manmade natural scenery.
  By using speakers placed outdoors and in tearoom along with computer generation software and evala’s original stereophonic technology, he will c reate new acoustic creation spaces. This sound system can also be used for future nature parks and public facilities, so it can serve as pioneering example of how to use cultural heritage sites to meld the environment with contemporary art for society to enjoy.

• Touring the Setouchi art area to see
  Setouchi Triennale 2019 and Okayama Art Summit 2019

  

  Nakazu Banshou-en is located in Marugame City, Kagawa Prefecture, which lies very close to two of the biggest international art festivals this year: the Setouchi Triennale 2019(*1) and the Okayama Art Summit 2019(*2). This will be the birth of a new spot to check out in Setouchi, which continues to gain renown as an area known for art.
  *1: @30 minutes to JR Marugame Station from Takamatsu Station
  *2: @50 minutes to JR Marugame Station from Okayama Station

About Nakazu Banshou-en & Marugame Art Museum

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  A circuit-style daimyo garden built in 1688 by Kyogoku Takatoyo, the second daimyo of Marugame. In the center of the garden is a pond with eight islands made to resemble the “eight views” found in Lake Biwa in Omi, the ancestral home of the Kyogoku Family. The name “Banshou-en” refers to all of nature, or rather the entirety of the universe, and the park is celebrated as one that embraces both of these concepts. The garden is also linked to the Marugame Art Museum, which was built in the style of flat-building tea ceremony arbor, while on the shoreside is the restaurant Kaifutei, which offers dining with a view of the garden.

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