Installation

The Voice of Inconstant Savage
Commissioned for the Engawa – Japanese Contemporary Art Season programme organized by Calouste Gulbenkian Museum's Modern Art Center, The Voice of Inconstant Savage is an immersive installation that superimposes a prayer inspired by the story of a 16th-century Portuguese missionary, a chant from a Kakure-Kirishitan (hidden Christians) prayer – a religion rooted in Nagasaki Prefecture –, a chant from the Karawara spirits of the Awá indigenous people – who live in the Amazon rainforest – and a chorus of Western Gregorian chant. Morinaga questions the position of the aesthetics of inconstancy in relation to the discourse of the “savage” that modern society confronts.

Field recordings

Sombat Simla: Master Of Bamboo Mouth Organ
Simla is known in Thailand as one of the greatest living players of the khene, the ancient bamboo mouth organ particularly associated with Laos but found throughout East and Southeast Asia. His virtuosic and endlessly inventive renditions of traditional and popular songs have earned him the title ‘the god of khene’, and he is known for his innovative techniques and ability to mimic other instruments and non-musical sound, including, as a writer for the Bangkok Post describes, ‘the sound of a train journey, complete with traffic crossings and the call of barbecue chicken vendors’.

Cinema

MAWARI KAGURA
東日本大震災により甚大な被害を受けた岩手県三陸海岸を舞台に、大津波を生き抜いた神楽とこの地に暮らす人びとの生活のベースにある力強さを描いたドキュメンタリー。三陸沿岸150キロにおよぶ地域の人びとの人生に寄り添いながら、神々や精霊が息づく三陸の地を340年以上にわたり神の使いとなって巡行の旅をつづけている「廻り神楽」。三陸の大津波を生き抜いた神楽衆が以前と同じように海辺を巡りはじめる。奏でる音色が死者を鎮魂し、海に生きる者の心を支える神楽衆たち、そして海と向き合いながらこの地に住み続ける人びとの日常が描かれる。

Cinema

Siege – A Closed Off Man
In 1935, the First High School (旧制第一高等学校) was relocated from Hongo to Komaba, where the students were separated from others and enhanced their homogeneity as First High School students by holing up on the campus. However, in an increasingly intense World War II, it was no longer possible to maintain the identity of the First High School. In the consciousness of a student, “I”, who has been devoting himself to research in a desire to identify with the First High School students, the image of First High School in the Komaba Campus era appears.