Festival/Tokyo aims to make the city a performance center

Tokyo has long been a worldwide center for popular music and film. Japan’s dance scene, sparked by the post-war movement of butoh, has received international attention as well. But the country’s contemporary theater has not been so widely appreciated.

Festival/Tokyo (F/T) aims to change that.

Worldwide works

A theater and performance fest, F/T evolved out of the smaller Tokyo International Arts Festival last year when it put on a spring and fall edition.

In 2010 the fest will take place once, from October 30 until November 28, and will offer a world-class level and range of programs.

Leading the way will be 15 performances presented by F/T (meaning the Tokyo production is organized and supported solely by them), and these will include renowned international directors like Gisèle Vienne (France), Rodrigo Garcia (Argentina/Spain) and Christoph Marthaler (Switzerland).

The program will also include work by celebrated Japanese director/choreographers Saburo Teshigawara and Ikuyo Kuroda, as well as cutting-edge theater group Gotanndadan, among others. 

Focus on creation

Program director Chiaki Soma, 35, explains the concept and process behind these productions: “Our idea is to be a festival of creation because we want to present our values to the public. Thus we have a close-knit dialog with the artists about their performance and move the relationship forward based on trust.”

As an example of this working method Soma points to the piece “This is how you will disappear” by Gisèle Vienne.

“I’ve been in dialog with Gisèle for the last three years and have been part of the process the whole way through. We’ve supported her with money and by introducing Japanese collaborators.”

Vienne’s work was highly praised at the world’s leading performance festival, Avignon, in July  this year, where it premiered.

The piece uses performers and life-size dolls (a favorite Vienne motif) to create a mysterious world replete with Greek gods Apollo and Dionysus.

After luring the audience in, Vienne then deconstructs the scenario and our concepts of normality along with it. Also featured in this remarkable creation is the fog sculpture of Fujiko Nakaya, the work of video artist Shiro Takatani and the lighting of Patrick Riou.

Festival values

Soma notes the festival has an extremely wide range of content and approaches to working with artists. Legendary dance creator Teshigawara will present “Skinners -- Dedicated to evaporating things” and Soma took a different tact with him.

“I didn’t know Teshigawara personally before I contacted him about F/T. Yet he had a very good understanding of our festival and he thought it would be great to present his dance work in a new context, that of a theater festival. Thus we commissioned a work by him.”

In explaining the multi-faceted fest, which will present a program of emerging artists, co-productions, many symposiums and other work, in addition to programs produced by F/T, Soma emphasizes the values of the fest as a whole. 

She explains, “When we speak about the values of F/T we cannot limit it to one set of ideas. It is quite dangerous to do so, but basically we want to show how different artists are dealing with contemporary society and how they approach different issues in contemporary society.

"In addition, it’s not so much what they describe but how they go about showing their understanding of contemporary issues,” says Soma.

Festival Tokyo, Tel: +81 (0) 3 5961 5202, www.festival-tokyo.jp/en