Yoichi Ochiai, Reminiscence of the Unknown, at Shibuya, 2020 落合陽一, 未知への追憶, マルイモディ, 渋谷, 2020
A virtual gallery tour of Yoichi Ochiai’s exhibition held in 2020 Summer, Shibuya, Tokyo. The theme of the solo exhibition, entitled “Reminiscence of the Unknown”, is a fascination with mass for the sake of the concept of the mediation of images and materials, computers and nature, and the mediation of the massive and the immaterial. The butterfly motif used throughout the exhibition is a symbol of materialization: the transformation of material things, from classic platinum prints to lithographic prints with thin film interference, displays with ultrasonic controlled reflective luster, and a contemporary take on 19th century projection equipment. Through some of his interpretive works, he questions what massiveness means that cannot be translated into data and evokes the longing we feel for nature and landscape.
In Tibetan Buddhism, there is a Buddhist tool called a maniwheel. It is said that spinning it has the same effect as praying words. As the maniwheel rotates in the landscape, it plays the words of prayer for reincarnation, reminding us of the harmony and transformation of the human soul and the landscape. This artwork is a sculpture that finds its inspiration there. And “borrowed scenery” is the principle of “incorporating background landscape into the composition of a garden” found in traditional East Asian garden design. This sculpture is a material mirror in the form of a wave. The apparatus is a material mirror, while it is a matter, defying gravity, and while it is a form, it is freed from its own form by reflection. The motions become part of the landscape transformer. These sculptures are supported by the integration of computer optimization calculations, fabrication technology, and magnetic technology. Waves are born in nature, in the ecosystem that we humans and the outside world create. Waves propagate. Forms receive waves. Forms transmit waves to intelligence. The intelligence drives the shapes through the waves. And again this creates waves. The intelligence converts the landscape into scenery. And the interaction between the intelligence and the waves creates another scene. Waves, matter, and intelligence. The linkage between them is beautiful. The undivided nature, the world, is a huge, single, holographic computing mechanism that uses natural waves. This work brings to the observer a new perception of the body connected to the landscape in both material and spirit.
Date of Completion: 2019-05-16 Media Used: 3D printed structure, Magnet, Electromagnet, Microcontroller, AC/DC converter Art Project Conceptual Description: Yoichi Ochiai freely crosses the boundaries of research and artistic activity, and continues to explore and express his philosophy. While engaging in media art as a meta-artistic activity that includes the invention of media devices and media contexts, he continues to think about the worldview of the Digital Nature, in which the material world with mass and the digital world of massless data melt together. In this context, media art is positioned as the vernacular folk art(“Mingei” in Japanese) of the Digital Nature, and is the subject of his activities. Based on the idea of oriental materialization (all things change and circulate without any formality), which is derived from Laozi and Zhuangzi, the works are rooted in the idea of the relationship between imaging devices and media devices since the 19th century, digital transformation and oriental materialization, and the similarity of natural phenomena and data. This artwork meditates these concepts into the scenery and sculptures. Project URL: https://yoichiochiai.com/art/materialization-of-wave/ Contact Email: ochyai.manage@gmail.com
