Artists
Japan
Akiko Keira
To Reduce the Distance
29.01.18 23.02.18
Akiko Keira was the first artist-in-residence of 2018 at Proyecto´ace.
ARTIST’S STATEMENT
For many years I’ve been drawing with the aim of making“doodle art” worthy of appreciation as an art form. However, after my first installation work for my private memory, it started having another meaning; I realized the significant influence location has on art. The next stage to explore other possibilities was Finland, a place I had never been before. My first work there was an attempt to counteract nature, which I saw as being greater than the humans it surrounded. Not surprisingly, nature had won. As a result I decided to make my second work closer to nature; I tried to blend with nature rather than oppose it.
Argentina is one of the most distant countries from Japan; therefore I intend to blend or oppose the differences between the two countries to reduce the distance; to harmonize them at the end as a sequel to the work in Finland. This doesn’t mean the geographical distance, but rather the emotional distance among the people of those two countries and whatnot. That could fit not only into two countries but also into current global issues. I hope to draw lines to connect the world everywhere.
BIO
Akiko Keira
Born in Tokyo, Japan
Lives and works in Chiba, Japan
EDUCATION
1992 | Women’s College of Fine Arts, Japan
EXHIBITIONS & COLLECTIONS
2014 | The room with Memories at the Ishikawa house in Gyoda, Saitama, Japan
2013 | Kobo, Tokyo, Japan
2011 | AN; collaboration between Drawings and Flete by Akiko Keira and Naoko Kamiya, Pont-Aven Coffee, Hamaya, Japan
2010 | Kobo, Tokyo, Japan
2003 | Space Kobo & Tomo, Tokyo, Japan
The collection of Kashiwa city, Kashiwa, Japan
AWARDS & RESIDENCIES
The 5th of TAMON Award: Award for excellence, Japan
The Graduation project Award, Women’s College of Fine Arts: Award for excellence, Japan
Arteles Creative Center, Hämeenkyrö, Finland
Related Activities
Exhibitions
To Reduce the Distance
Akiko Keira
21.02.18 23.02.18
TO REDUCE THE DISTANCE
Akiko Keira, first artist in residence from Japan at ´ace, is an artist who lives and transits the spaces in which she is with a very acute sensibility, highlighting its atmospheres and spirits. During her time in Buenos Aires, she worked in the Políglota Room at ´ace and during the February 2018 Open Studio we were able to enjoy her installation, listen to her talk about her production process and participate with a gift that each one received.
Akiko made connections between Japan and Argentina as well as with Finland, where she made an artistic residency in the past. We could see skies with that seemed to be the same but they belonged to each one of those different places that the artist had traveled to. Her passage through the city of Buenos Aires, thanks to her patient contemplation, made us know new points of interest and visualize common places with a more aesthetic look.
Open Studio
Open Studio #01_2018
Artists in Dialogue
21.02.18
On Wednesday February 21st, 2018 we shared the first Open Studio of the year, in which the artists in residence Akiko Keira and Liz Ingram presented their projects for colleagues and participants of the artistic circuit of Buenos Aires.
After 4 weeks of residence, the Japanese artist Akiko Keira presented her project To Reduce the Distance almost in a performative way, through which she proposed to present in Buenos Aires images and objects that she brought from Japan and Finland, a country in which she made a residency some months before. Akiko created an atmosphere of immersion that, through its Zen rhythm, forces viewers to practice the necessary patience before encountering difference, thereby distinguishing it from our daily rhythm.
Liz Ingram, on her part, gave a talk in which she told about her training, her time as a professor at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Canada and presented different projects that she has carried out. In addition, she shared her projections for her time in Buenos Aires, since Liz did a 5-month residency that included the temporary artistic direction of Proyecto´ace.
Related artists
ARTISTS
Liz Ingram (Canada)
Temporary Artistic Director
Akiko Keira (Japan)
Artist-in-residence
