This public meeting shares the creative process behind In Between . . . Us?, held in a park in Tokyo as part of the 2025 CCBT artist fellow Yamauchi Shota’s Encounters with the Unknown project.
This public meeting shares the creative process behind In Between . . . Us?, held in a park in Tokyo as part of the 2025 CCBT artist fellow Yamauchi Shota’s Encounters with the Unknown project.
The 2025 CCBT artist fellow Yamauchi Shota’s Encounters with the Unknown project starts from the simple question of what is the unknown, and then attempts to envisage new forms of communication not reliant on linguistic frameworks. As part of this project, Yamauchi is holding a public meeting to share the creative process behind In Between . . . Us?, his upcoming exhibition in a park in Tokyo.
A distinctive feature of the Encounters with the Unknown project is its rhizomatic production approach in which rather than bring about a single artist’s vision, the work is produced as it transmutes in relation to the collaborators’ various expertise and the environment. A rhizome originally refers to an underground stem, and but as a conceptual term, means a state of having no center or starting point, growing in multiple directions with various generative bases. Though Yamauchi’s project does indeed begin with ideas of one artist, the work produced over the course of it does not converge into a single complete image, but rather emphasizes the process itself, out of which it arises while encompassing branches and deviations.
The public meeting brings together collaborators with various expertise, including artist Yamauchi Shota, a director, engineers, performers, and sculptors. Instead of a one-sided talk where participants simply talk at the audience, the event aspires to broaden the regular production meetings that Yamauchi holds and to make the proceedings and content available to the general public.
The event offers audiences the chance to glimpse the process of trial and error by which the exhibition is created, and to gain insights into thought process of the production team.
There will be breaks during the event as well as outdoor tests. Audiences can enter and exit at any time.
Project: Encounters with the Unknown
What is the unknown? Starting from that question, this project envisages new forms of human-to-humanoid communication that do not rely on conventional linguistic frameworks. The project will result in an outdoor performance and installation, limning the moment when an unknown entity and human intersect. The unknown entity appears in the form of light and sound, as if alive in the park, and the human body gradually resonates with the light until nonverbal communication eventually begins. As the audience witnesses this process, they encounter a moment when the boundaries of existence blur.
CCBT Art Incubation Program
One of CCBT’s core programs, the Art Incubation Program provides opportunities for creative talent to undertake new projects and makes those processes accessible to the public, facilitating forms of artistic expression, exploration, and action that change our city for the better. Selected through an open call, five artist fellows will act as CCBT partners, developing their projects, making the creative process public, exhibiting the results, and holding workshops and talks.
