Image: Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media
Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM] has announced ‘Monument of Odour, Forgotten Eros’, a new performance and installation by artist Shota Yamauchi. The event is framed by YCAM as a new work in performance and installation form, and the center says the piece is a collaboration with Yamauchi and YCAM.
The project is set across four performances in Studio B in Yamaguchi: January 11 at 7 pm, January 12 at 3 pm, January 18 at 7 pm, and January 19 at 3 pm. According to YCAM’s event information, the work was presented as a world premiere. Tickets were required, with advance sales beginning on November 2, 2024, and advance sales ending on January 18, 2025 at 7 pm. YCAM also noted that preschool-aged children were not admitted.
YCAM describes Yamauchi as an artist who has continued to present stage works and installations focused on smell in recent years. For this collaboration, the center says the work begins with body odor and considers the relationship between the individual and society. That emphasis places the piece within Yamauchi’s broader interest in the possibilities of technology and bodily expression, a theme the institution highlights in its own presentation of the event.
The event also included post-performance programs. On January 12, a post-talk was scheduled after the performance in Studio B, with Yamauchi and Ryukichi Suzuki, identified in the source material as a former perfumer and researcher of olfactory culture, taking part. A second post-talk was scheduled after the January 18 performance, featuring Yamauchi, Harutsuki Ota and Kazutoshi Tsuda, identified as researchers.
In addition, YCAM planned after-hours café sessions on January 11 at 8 pm and January 19 at 4 pm in the second-floor gallery. The center presented these as part of the event’s post-performance activities. The page also lists childcare information for the event period, including advance reservation requirements and fees, alongside the note that children under school age were not allowed.
The credits show the scale of the production around the work. Yamaguchi City and the Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion are listed as organizers, with support from the Yamaguchi City Board of Education and assistance under Japan’s Agency for Cultural Affairs program for cultural and arts creation hubs. Cooperation is credited to KYOTO EXPERIMENT, the Arts Council Tokyo TAAP program, Takasago International Corporation, the Yamaguchi Prefectural Industrial Technology Institute, Ube Rikagaku, and several named researchers and professors. YCAM InterLab is credited as a co-developer, and YCAM is listed as the producer. The work’s concept, structure, direction and video are credited to Shota Yamauchi, with joint direction by dancer and choreographer Neji Pijin and assistant direction by dancer and choreographer Tatsunori Imamura.
