Ethnic Collection “Bricolage”
We will hold a bricolage exhibition again this year with 20 artists.
The artists will take broken parts from the valuable collection of ethnic goods and transform them into new works of art.
Cultural anthropologist Yoshihiko Yamaguchi has collected more than 20,000 artifacts and living creatures while living with ethnic minorities in various regions.
Some of the items in this vast collection have been damaged in the process of preservation and can no longer be used as they should be.
These objects were nurtured in the mysterious nature.
What will we, the people of today, receive from them and pass them on to future generations?
Please come and see the breath of life created by TRACING THE ROOTS exhibiting artists who have diverse roots and expressions.
Ethnic Collection “Bricolage”
2023.10.10 Tue – 10.15 Sun 11:00-18:00
＊ Fri 13:00-18:00、Sun 11:00-17:00
Yoshihiko Yamaguchi (Cultural Anthropology Researcher)
Born in Tsuruoka City, Yamagata Prefecture in 1942.Started his fieldwork around 1967, traveling to 85 countries in Asia and Africa, and began research in the Amazon basin in 1971. After returning to Japan, he devoted himself to promoting international understanding and exchange in his hometown ,Tsuruoka City, and served as the director of the Amazon Museum of Ethnology. In 2005, he received the Tsuruoka City Government Meritorious Service Award. Currently, he is an advisor to the General incorporated association Amazon Museum.
As a young boy who loved insects, his first dream was to visit the “Insect Kingdom” of the Amazon forest with its giant beetles and shining blue Morpho butterflies. While studying in France, he was fascinated by the fieldwork of Levi Strauss and became deeply interested in the life and culture of the indigenous people living in the Amazon. His dream has since grown, and for more than 40 years he has been researching, studying, and collecting materials related to the harmony of nature and culture in the Amazon.
https://amazon-resources.org/
Message from Mr. Yoshihiko Yamaguchi
The indigenous people living in the Amazon recognize themselves as part of the forest, and have continued to make the tools necessary for their daily lives with the blessings of nature and the wisdom they have inherited. Many of the tools I inherited from them have not returned to the soil even after half a century, but have retained their original forms, retaining the spirituality of the indigenous people.
This Bricolage Exhibition is an unprecedented attempt to breathe “life” into damaged ethnic materials with the sense of contemporary art, and I am very much looking forward to seeing what kind of works will be completed.
The materials for the works also include objects of daily life made from familiar items by indigenous peoples outside of the Amazon. I am hopeful that by combining these materials, we can create a worldview that is both innovative and diverse.
