AIR Talk
The Geography of Abandoned People ーSpatiality, Resistance and Art Activism in East Asia
Curator Talk by Alice Ko
The talk will take Funamoto Shuji as a reflection of contemporary human condition in emerging process of urban change in East Asia.Funamoto Shuji was born in Manchuria in 1945. Since 1968, he has been active in the day-workers’ labor movement in Osaka and Tokyo’s Yoseba (the day-labor market. Day-workers were the workers who were used and disposed of on a day-to-day basis, suffering from very unstable working and living conditions. Most radically problematizing the characteristics of the day-workers who appeared in the process of Japan’s modernization, Funamoto defined them as “fluid underclass workers.” He also stressed the fact that they had been mobilized by state policy and then ruled and disposed of by the violent labor control. In June 1975, Funamoto self-immolated in front of the gate of the US Kadena Military Base, protesting against the Okinawa visit of the crown emperor, Akihito.
The speaker will take Funamoto’s path as a unique point and a historical perspective to look into the impact of state and social relations on urban development in contemporary society. And from different East Asian geographical locations, such as the border, shelter, and labour market areas, as its starting points to reflect on the connections between national and politics of life. Through a great amount of fieldwork, artists have investigated, narrated, and made a collective effort to create different sample slides, which have created a diverse portrayal of East Asia in spatial contexts.And how artists through an understanding of geographic space, wandering, and settling, at the borders of their home country and community, to themselves, the land, and others, and those that have been defined as dangerous and contagious objects; those excluded from the city set out on a journey for the renewed pursuit and the process of establishing a dual perspective.
Bio
Alice Ko as an independent curator and researcher focusing on building the connection and platform of the contemporary art in East Asia.Her curatorial practice centers around use of urban studies in East Asia, artistic action, social movement, and colonial history.In 2013, she was the curator of Reverse Niche – Dialogue and Rebuilding at the City’s Edge (Hong Kong, Osaka and Taiwan). In 2014, she participated in the Bi-City Biennale of Urbanism\ Architecture (Hong Kong) and organized the symposium We Are Everywhere—Community Art in the mist of Proletarianized Spatial Production—A Critical Approach (Hong Kong). In 2015, she was the curator of Beyond the Borderline- Exiles from the Native Land (Taiwan, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Korea and Beijing).
Lostgens’ Artist Residency Project 2016
Date
25th Sep 2016
Time
3:30pm
Venue
Lostgens’ Contemporary Art Space
Language
English
Sponsor
Ministry of Culture (Taiwan)
