Event: Experimental film screening in NY

[sharon hayashi]

To compliment the wonderful Japanese Experimental Film program at 
Anthology Film Archives in New York at the beginning of December, a 
night of Jonouchi Motoharu and Kato Yoshihiro films are playing at an 
alternative music space, Tonic,  on November 21st.  Many of you will 
know Kato as the catalyst behind the avant-garde art troupe Zero Jigen. 
These films are rarely screened even in Japan and include Jonouchi's Hi 
Red Center Shelter Plan which features artists such as Akasegawa Genpei 
and Ono Yoko.

Sharon


CINEMA & SITUATIONS

J A P A N E S E  E X P E R I M E N T A L  F I L M  N I G H T

November 21st, at 8:00 PM

Film Works of Motoharu Jonouchi and

Yoshihiro Kato (Zero Dimension)

 

PROGRAM A: Films byMotoharu Jonouchi

“Hi Red Center Shelter Plan”1964

“WOLS”1965

“The Mass Collective Bargaining At Nihon University”1968

“Gewaltopia Trailer”1968

 

PROGRAM B: A Film byYoshihiro Kato(Zero Dimension)

“The White Hare of Inaba”1970(2004 version)

 

A d m i s s i o n $ 7

November 21st, at 8:00 PM

TONIC

107 Norfolk Street, New York, NY 10002 • 212·358·7501
 

ABOUT THE DIRECTORS

 

M O T O H A R U J O N O U C H I

 

Born in 1935, in Ibaragi Prefecture. Jonouchi entered the Art 
Department of Nihon University; in 1957, along with his colleague 
Katsumi Hirano, he co-founded the Film Study Group in the Fine Art 
Department of Nihon University. He co-directed “The Record of N [N no 
Kiroku]” (59), the second production by the collective, documenting the 
disaster of the Ise Bay Typhoon. “Pou Pou” (60) is a chain of 
amorphously expanding phantasmagoric images, with insertions of the 
images taken from film classics. During the same period, looking ahead 
to the future after graduation, he co-founded the VAN Institute for 
Cinematic Science as a forum for film production, and began living 
communally with five members including Masao Adachi. In correspondence 
with the anti-art movement of the time, VAN Institute assumed a place 
for artists working in various media to gather together. A documentary 
of the Anti-Japan-US Security Treaty struggle of 1960, “Document 6.15” 
(61), was screened at the memorial assembly for Michiko Kanba, who was 
killed at the demonstration in front of the Diet Building. It was a 
pioneering experiment of ‘intermedia’ in Japan which showed symbolic 
close-up images of Kanbara along with the scenes re-enacting police 
brutality, meanwhile two completely different soundtracks were played 
together, slide projections of paintings were going on, and a live 
happening was taking place at the venue. Jonouchi subsequently produced 
“Document LSD” (62), documenting a public LSD experiment using himself 
as the object; “Hi Red Center Shelter Plan” (64), that was about an art 
event at the Imperial Hotel; “WOLS”(65), consisting of fragments of a 
painting by WOLS, which were put together through in-camera editing; 
“Hijikata Tatsumi,” which shot the stage of Tatsumi Hijikata frame by 
frame. Towards the 70’s Anti-Japan-US Security Treaty Struggle, he 
continued to document the student uprising, while successively 
producing the “Gewaltopia series” including “Hakusan Street by Nihon 
University [Nichidai Hakusan-dori]”(68), “The Mass Collective 
Bargaining at Nihon University” (68), “Gewaltopia Trailer” (69), and 
“Shinjuku Station” (74). By including live performances which created 
improvised sounds and editing the films differently for each screening, 
and thus negating the idea of film as being complete, repeatable, and 
consumable

—   Jonouchi pursued ‘cinematic revolution.’

 

 

 

Y O S H I H I R O K A T O

 

Born in 1936, Nagoya. With Shinichi Iwata, he co-founded the 
avant-garde artistic group “Zero Jigen [Zero Dimension] ”; after moving 
to Tokyo, they did the street performances called, “Ceremonies” in 
Ginza, Shinjuku, and Shibuya. Their numerous acts of ‘artistic 
terrorism’ where a group of naked men with kitschy costumes and props 
suddenly appeared on the street and proceeded therein cannot be 
categorized into a conventional notion of ‘work’; Zero Jigen did 
collaborations with artists of various media, and culminated as The 
Joint Struggle Faction for Crashing Expo ’70 [Banpakuhakai Kyoto-ha]. 
“The White Hare of Inaba”(70) is a document of the struggles of Zero 
Jigen, which persisted in one-time-ness of expression during the time 
of high economic growth when artistic expression came to be easily 
commodified and consumed.