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Greek myth and Japanese folklore. Vibrant colours and a vague sense of foreboding. These are the elements that collide in the Joe Kalturnyk and Takashi Iwasaki’s vision of the idyllical peaceful in Halcyon/Kawasemi, currently on display at the Plug In Institute of Contemporary Art at the University of Winnipeg.
The shared ground of story that Greek and Japanese lore share in this work is living in a suspended place above the earth and its troubles, much like a bird. “’Kawasemi’ is ‘kingfisher’ in Japanese, and ‘halcyon’ refers to kingfisher,” says Kalturnyk, highlighting the the symbolism of the bird suspended over the earth and separate from time.
The joyous, uplifting atmosphere of the piece is one that Iwasaki loves to inhabit in all of his creations. When Kalturnyk – a frequent collaborator – approached him with this idea, Iwasaki knew that he could resonate with it, even if it did have the nefarious notion that a halcyon could not last forever.
“I think in contemporary arts – at least for the past decades – it's been probably the thing that beauty is something low quality, or something to be dismissed about,” says Iwasaki. “People didn’t probably take beauty and aesthetic quality of any art really seriously since the rise of conceptual art. People probably think, ‘Oh, it’s escapism from something real.’ But my take on that is there’s always both things in life: something negative, something positive, and something in between.”
Iwasaki and Kalturnyk have been working on the idea behind Halcyon/Kawasemi for the better part of three years with the latest iteration of the idea being the version currently on display at the Plug In Institute. UV light shines on a spinning mass that is suspended above the floor, which Kalturnyk notes serves to heighten the foreboding; is it flying into Halcyon or is it crashing to earth.
“There’s something quite interesting about scale in this piece,” says Kalturnyk, “how scale really shifts, how the more it engulfs people, the more it pulls people in. I think that was one thing I really wanted to push in this particular exhibition is we had to come up with a really winning strategy on how to create this effect.”
Lots has changed in the world in the three years since the duo first conceived of the work. Given the unknown nature of the halcyon that the piece inhabits inside the Plug In Institute, Iwasaki does not think that the current circumstances of the world around the art have much impact on the viewing experience for the audience. “It’s hard to say if [life’s] always negative or positive... same coin flipped on the other side. It’s still the same coin. It’s how you read it, I think. It’s kind of beautiful either way.”
Halcyon/Kawasemi runs until July 26 at the Plug In Institute of Contemporary Art at the University of Winnipeg. Visit their website for hours and more information.