Haris Epaminonda

Japan Diaries, 2020

Japan Diaries was created in Tokyo during Haris Epaminondas’ time there as recipient of the 2019/2020 Mercedes-Benz Art Scope scholarship. The film, which has been transferred to video, was created by the artist using an 8mm camera. It presents an admixture of direct recordings Epaminonda took from real life as well as footage of various screens and monitors which the artist happened upon and spontaneously documented. The interplay of abstract-geometric vocabulary of forms with charged content is characteristic of her work: Fluidly arranged historical images are combined with culturally significant symbols, such as the stylized form of the chrysanthemum (a reference to the seal of Imperial Japan) brought together with readymade visuals from the spheres of advertising, television and the internet. With her selection of pieces from the album Soundscape 1: Surround, 1986, by Hiroshi Yoshimura, a pioneer of ambient music, Epaminonda emphatically roots her film Japan Diaries in a still little-known aspect of Japanese culture of the 1980s.