Aoyama Shin | "Ghost: When the Unseen Becomes Visible" (Part 1)
The exhibition "Ghost: When the Unseen Becomes Visible" at Arts Maebashi explores ghosts as past, future, and uncertain visions, questioning the very act of viewing.Summary
The exhibition "Ghost: When the Unseen Becomes Visible," held at Arts Maebashi, featured works by 20 artists including Ai Iwane, Tadanori Yokoo, and Christian Boltanski. According to the statement, the term "ghost" is used broadly to encompass everything "unrooted," such as the past arising from history, culture, and politics, or the premonition of an uncertain future, acting as a medium connecting the past and future. This concept is also linked to recent trends in horror expression and the pursuit of inhumanity, like liminal spaces. The author argues that "ghost" is not merely a metaphor but the power of metaphor itself, suggesting that our own cognitive system for perceiving the unknown is an uncontrollable ghost. Furthermore, the subtitle "When the Unseen Becomes Visible" refers to the act of viewing itself; encountering ghosts of the past and future simultaneously relativizes our sense of time, causing the present moment to also drift as a ghost, indicating the curation stages an encounter where the contours of "ghost" and "time" transform.
(Source：artscape)