Tabaimo: Innovation and Identity. Japanese Society from the International Biennial Art of Venecia (2011)

Abstract

This research analyzes the work of Japanese artist Tabata Ayako (Nagano, 1975) from the perspective of innovation and identity. Focus is put on her exhibition at The Venice Biennale in 2011, a decisive point of her career, since she was selected as the flag bearer in this so-called “art Olympics”. Along this paper, her work at the Biennial is framed in the context of cultural diplomacy and it is analyzed how the the artist´s approach trying to highlight that her most authentic contributions come from local color and local flavor. It emerges that her Japanese self is the contribution she can make to the world of art in a unique way. However, a section dedicated to studying the meaning of the term nippon in her titles makes us see that this positioning does not leave aside a criticism of her own society, asking her compatriots for greater critical capacity and personal involvement in society. On the other hand, analyzing her work makes it clear that identity is not something anchored in the past, as she herself demonstrates by plunging into the digital world. In order to carry out this research, a phenomenological-hermeneutical methodology has been used that has allowed us to reach a series of particular conclusions about her work, but also with a more general character about the subject of identity, innovation and artistic interrelations.