A local creator proposes a new way to enjoy the coast: “NIGHT WAVE,” an installation of waves and light

"Media art" that gets people in town to participate

-- Mr. Ishita, you have been involved in art events such as "Media Arts Zushi", but how did you start working in Zushi?

I used to live in Tokyo, but then I lived in England for a while, and after returning to Japan, I started living in Zushi, which has a natural environment and is easy to get into Tokyo. I had always wanted to work in projection mapping after returning to Japan, but I happened to meet the principal of Zushi Elementary School, and he told me that he wanted to do a project that could be shown to children at school, and that's how I got my start. That was the start.

Projection mapping held at Zushi Elementary School

Since Zushi does not have an art museum or a small number of galleries, we thought it would be more interesting for creators to incorporate their ideas into the city, so the following year we changed the format to a festival and held a media art festival.

At first, even the locals didn't really understand what projection mapping was, but it gradually became a hot topic, and both citizens and government officials realized that people were gathering. In addition, we devised ways to promote the event so that people in the shopping district could participate positively. We created individual posters for each store with copy related to art. I asked the copywriter to create the poster in a way that felt like half a thousand knocks, but the people in the town were quite amused by it, and it became a mechanism for people to go around town just to see the poster. Ta.

“Media Arts Zushi” “Word Poster Exhibition” posted throughout the shopping district

I believe that local events will not be successful unless we gain the understanding of the local community, so we made sure to work steadily on this, even if it meant spending time and effort. I think it's because of this kind of foundation that the NIGHT WAVE project has been able to expand so successfully and with such speed.