Artist talk by SHIMURAbros

SHIMURAbros are the sister and brother artist duo of Yuka and Kentaro Shimura, currently researchers at Studio Olafur Eliasson and exemplifying a new breed of Japanese contemporary artists. Working and exhibiting internationally, SHIMURAbros are known for incorporating elements of sculpture, installation and avant-garde filmmaking in their work. Film is the catalyst to all their creations and the artists employ different techniques to each work. As an exploration of the history of moving images approached from a fundamentally different perspective extending film beyond its two-dimensional limit – their installations are an intricate and playful re-working of film and cinematic language.

Programmed in partnership with Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts London, home to the British Artists‘ Film & Video Study Collection which holds a large amount of material for academic research in artists’ moving image, this talk will highlight SHIMURAbros’ film and moving image installations, with a focus on the artistic content, formalistic qualities and contexts at play in working within the canon. The talk will be followed by discussion with Keith Whittle, researcher and Japan Foundation Fellow, exploring the role technology, cinematic history and popular culture has on the aesthetic and conceptual approach the artists’ have to their work, in terms of research and exhibition.

SHIMURAbros have exhibited widely including at Art Basel Hong Kong; 798 Art Factory; The National Art Centre, Tokyo; NUS Museum Singapore; MOCA (Museum of Contemporary Art Taipei); PICA(the Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts Museum), Australia; Museums Quartier, Vienna. “SEKILALA” received the Excellence Prize (Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology Prize) at the 13th Japan Media Arts Festival.