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The Kyoto Association of Corporate Executives, Kyoto Prefecture, and Kyoto City hereby announce the founding of the Kyoto International Festival of Contemporary Culture Organizing Committee, and the presentation of Parasophia: Kyoto International Festival of Contemporary Culture 2015 from early March to early May, 2015.

Parasophia:
Kyoto International Festival of Contemporary Culture 2015

Early March to early May, 2015
Kyoto, Japan

Artistic Director: Shinji Kohmoto (former Chief Curator, The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto)

The Kyoto International Festival of Contemporary Culture is an international exhibition presented by the Kyoto International Festival of Contemporary Culture Organizing Committee, the Kyoto Association of Corporate Executives, Kyoto Prefecture, and Kyoto City that brings together the rich cultural heritage and the vibrant academic environment of Kyoto.

Parasophia: Kyoto International Festival of Contemporary Culture 2015 will feature approximately forty artists from Japan and abroad. The Artistic Director and his curatorial team will conduct part of their research for Parasophia: Kyoto International Festival of Contemporary Culture 2015 publicly, in the form of lectures and other events in an Open Research Program.

About the Title:

The title of Kyoto International Festival of Contemporary Culture 2015 was conceived based on the following conditions: It must be fitting for a large-scale international exhibition, and it should have the capacity to draw the interest of many different people.  It should be slightly mysterious and easy to remember for the Japanese, and it should have the potential to communicate the main idea of Kyoto International Festival of Contemporary Culture 2015 to people of various cultures overseas.  This criteria led me to the word “Parasophia.”

“Parasophia” was inspired by the femininity of the word sophia, the light ring of the word para, the visual image these words suggest, and Kyoto’s position on the world map.  It is a coinage derived from the Greek para and sophia, the latter meaning “wisdom,” and the former being a prefix meaning “beside or adjacent to” or “beyond or distinct from, but analogous to,” as in paradox, parasol, parachute, paraphrase, paranoia, parameter, and so on.  In the context of high school Chemistry, the term para also indicates a combining form designating the position straight across the hexagonal aromatic compound known as the benzene ring.  The four other positions are ortho and meta (see diagram).  Ortho generally means “straight” or “upright,” as in orthodox, and meta suggests something that is “higher” or “beyond.”  I prefer para to the rigidness of ortho and to the sense of hierarchy suggested by meta.

When I thought of “Parasophia,” the Hagia Sophia—which embodies the wisdom of the Eastern Roman Empire, the Byzantine Empire, and Islam—came to mind.  The Hagia Sophia in Istanbul and Kyoto sit on the eastern and western ends of the Asian continent, in a para orientation from one another on the world map.  Istanbul is one of the starting points of the Silk Road, while Kyoto is among the end points of this important route.  I felt that this geographical relationship between the two cities was extremely symbolic when thinking about Kyoto as a site of international exchange and cultural production.

Additionally, the diagram of the benzene ring brings the history of Kyoto and the transition of its urban structure to mind. Kyoto can be described as a magic circle of sorts that connects the past with the future and is brimming with endless possibilities.  The talent and intelligence that form bonds with Kyoto conceive of new ideas and receive inspiration for new creations and expressions from this city, while also adding to the power and potential of Kyoto.  “Parasophia” is meant to represent Kyoto’s position as an instrument of intellectual and cultural production, rather than a city that merely consumes.

Shinji Kohmoto

Artistic Director Shinji Kohmoto

Born in Kyoto. Completed the Master’s Program in Design at the Graduate School of Engineering and Design, Kyoto Institute of Technology.  Curator at the National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto since 1981; Chief Curator from 2006 to 2010.

Kohmoto was one of the four Artistic Directors of Yokohama 2001: International Triennale of Contemporary Art (2001), the first Yokohama Triennale, subtitled Mega-Wave—Towards a New Synthesis, with fellow artistic directors Nobuo Nakamura, Fumio Nanjo, and Akira Tatehata.  He was also on the jury for the Golden Lion for Best National Participation at the 50th International Art Exhibition of the Venice Biennale (2003), and the selection committee for the artistic director of Documenta 12 (2007).

Exhibitions curated by Kohmoto include Against Nature: Japanese Art in the Eighties (1989), a landmark presentation of contemporary Japanese Art that he co-curated with Kathy Halbreich, Thomas Sokolowski, and Fumio Nanjo, and which toured across the United States until 1991; Project for Survival (1996), a cutting-edge exhibition featuring seven artists and projects from the early 1970s to 1996, all underrepresented in Japan up to that point, that deal with the ways an individual or an institution builds relationships with and survives in contemporary society; and William Kentridge—What We See & What We Know: Thinking About History While Walking, and Thus the Drawings Began to Move (2009), one of the biggest solo exhibitions of the artist’s work and the first in Japan, which was awarded for its excellent curation.