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Garden of the appellation / maze walking /Hiromi Miyakita ･ Akio Suzuki

EVENTS

Garden of the appellation / maze walking /Hiromi Miyakita ･ Akio Suzuki

Upcoming

Type: Performance

Venue: Nihonbashi/Bakurocho Area

Etoile Kaito Living Bldg.

1-15-15 Higashikanda, Chiyoda-ku

Date: 12/12/2025 Fri.
2:00 PM - 2:45 PM Doors open at 1:30 PM

Ticket: [Tickets on sale soon!] Admission: General 2,200 yen, Students 1,500 yen
[Tickets on sale soon!] Discounted Admission: General 1,200 yen, Students 500 yen

※Even if you have already entered, the discount applies if you have a valid Etoile Kaito Living Hall viewing ticket. Please be sure to bring it with you on the day.
Even if you have a valid Etoile Kaito Living Hall viewing ticket, the discount applies. Please be sure to bring it with you on the day.
※At the entrance, please have your ticket torn at the 1st floor reception desk and receive your visitor pass.
Please transfer elevators on the 5th floor and proceed to the 7th floor.

“o to da te” in Tokyo Biennale 2025 Performance Recorded Near (October 16, 2025)
Photography: Yuka Ikenoya [YUKAI]

Etoile Kaito Living Hall 7th Floor presents Eiji Watanabe’s installation work “Garden of Names”.

At this location, sound artist Akio Suzuki and performer Yumi Miyakita will perform a collaboration with the Garden of Names. This special performance was born from the encounter between Eiji Watanabe and Akio Suzuki.

■Location: Within “The Garden of Names / Etoile Kaito Installation,” 7th Floor, Etoile Kaito Living Hall

■Performers: Hiromi Miyakita, dance “Butterfly Mindlessly Seeks Flowers” / Akio Suzuki, “Sound Staff”

Eiji Watanabe: Garden of Names / Étoile Kaito Installation (Étoile Kaito Living Hall, 7th Floor) Photography: Yuka Ikenoya

~Comments by Eiji Watanabe on the Performance at “The Garden of Names”~

I first met the two artists
when I invited them to participate in an art project I co-founded with Obu City, Aichi Prefecture in 2021.
(Curated by guest curator Satsuki Yamamoto)

There have been two previous collaborations with “The Garden of Names.”
One was in 2004, proposed by eca UNION (Edinburgh College of Art Students’ Union) at the Sculpture Court (a multipurpose space). The idea involved bringing about 100 alarm clocks into “The Garden of Names,” where they would begin ringing amidst the flowers like insect sounds, each with a different tone.

The other was during my participation in ArtZuid 2017, the Amsterdam International Sculpture Biennale. Within the “Garden of Names” spread across the exhibition site, the Art Chapel, artist Paul Goede presented “Mental Color”.

Since both were collaborations involving sound, the image of collaborating with Mr. Akio Suzuki and Mr. Miyakita, who I worked with at the Tokyo Biennale this time, naturally came to mind.

“o to da te” in Tokyo Biennale 2025 Performance Recorded Near (October 16, 2025)
Photography: Yuka Ikenoya [YUKAI]

Since our connection began at the Art of List exhibition (Obu, Aichi), I found myself drawn to Eiji’s “Garden of Names” at the Tokyo Biennale 2025.
Tiptoeing, shuffling, the two wanderers rely on sound…

Artists

Related exhibition

Installation

Eiji Watanabe: Garden of the appellation / Etoile Kaito Installation

Eiji Watanabe is known for his installations using cut out images of plants and creatures from illustrated guides arranged in countless numbers within physical spaces. In addition to presenting his work worldwide, he remains active in creating art spaces with his own hands in various locations, inviting young artists and international artists to collaborate and realize diverse projects. The centerpiece of this exhibition is the latest rendering of the series Garden of the Appellation, featuring images cut from plant and butterfly field guides arranged across floors and walls. This series began in 1992 and has developed across numerous locations. In plant and butterfly guides, diverse organisms are discovered, named, and classified by observers, accompanied by illustrations and descriptions. For instance, when one learns the name of a plant or mushroom encountered on a walk, it is only then that the object before them emerges as something identifiable within oneself, recognized as possessing individuality. When these confirmed illustrations are cut out and recreated anew in a different space as a “garden of the appellation,” we witness a fresh human-made nature. The venue also features the work CATCH & RELEASE, which expresses phrases connected to the piece using light bulbs, along with interactive installations allowing visitors to engage with the work. Workshops titled “Let’s Make a Horse-Head Cane!” are also scheduled to be held during the exhibition period. Special Cooperation: Etoile Kaito & Co., Inc. Cooperation: Tokyo University of the Arts

Ongoing 10/17/2025 - 12.14 / Etoile Kaito Living Bldg.

Sound-walk

Akio Suzuki: “o to da te” in Tokyo Biennale 2025

Akio Suzuki, known as a pioneer of sound art in Japan, has pursued the relationship between sound and space since the 1960s, developing “self-study events,” performances, and installations both domestically and internationally. For this festival, we are presenting o to da te, a representative project focusing specifically on “listening” within Suzuki’s wide-ranging activities, at six locations (16 points) across Tokyo. o to da te is a project where participants, like in the “nodate” tea ceremony held outdoors, can open their senses by listening carefully as they get a sense of the scenery at designated points. Each point was discovered by Suzuki himself as he explored the city, seeking out locations where unique environmental sounds and reverberations could be heard. At these selected points, markers are installed featuring a form readable as both feet standing together and ears listening. Participants visit these points using a map, which includes places like an ancient tree facing a historic temple precinct or areas surrounding bustling streets lined with museums and galleries. Standing quietly alone on a mark switches on your auditory awareness, allowing you to listen intently to the sounds present in each moment. There, all of us become active as both listeners and composers, as we spend time in this engaged state. Special Support: Ishibashi Foundation

Ongoing 10/17/2025 - 12.14 / ①②③④ Around the Kyobashi Saiku
(Artizon Museum/TODA BUILDING) / ⑤⑥ Around Etoile Kaito Living Bldg. / ⑦ Myojin Otoko-zaka Stairs (Kanda Shrine) / ⑧⑨ Around Suehirocho Station / ⑩⑪ Around Matsuzakaya Ueno / ⑫⑬ Benten-do Temple / ⑭⑮⑯ Toeizan Kan'ei-ji Temple Kompon Chu-do

Reference image: An Encouragement of Dawdling; "o to da te" and "no zo mi," 2018–2019
Collection of the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo

Reference Image: An Encouragement of Dawdling "o to da te" and "no zo mi (ki zu ki – 2),", 2018–2019.
Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo

Courtesy of Beethoven Foundation for Art and Culture Bonn / Photo by Meike Boeschemeyer

Akio Suzuki

Sound artist. Born in 1941. Since his infamous Throwing Objects Down a Staircase event at Nagoya Station in 1963 and the self study events which followed, where he explored the processes of “projection” and “following” in the natural world, Suzuki has pursued listening as a practice. In the 1970s he created and began performing on a number of original instruments, including the echo instrument Analapos. In 1988 he performed his piece Space in the Sun, which involved purifying his ears for twenty four hours in nature on the meridian line that runs through Amino, Kyoto. In 1996, he began his “oto da te” project where he seeks out echo points in the urban environment. Has performed and exhibited at many venues and music festivals around the world, including Documenta8 (Germany,1987), the British Museum (2002), Musée Zadkine (France, 2004), Kunstmuseum Bonn (Germany, 2018), Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo(Tokyo, 2019), etc.

http://www.akiosuzuki.com/

Participating Event

Listening to the Tokyo Biennale

An Art Festival Experience That Doesn't Use Your Eyes / Listening to the Biennale with a Dialogue in the Dark Attendant

Garden of the appellation / maze walking /Hiromi Miyakita ･ Akio Suzuki

Participating Project

Akio Suzuki: “o to da te” in Tokyo Biennale 2025

Ueno/Okachimachi Area

Kanda/Akihabara Area

Nihonbashi/Bakurocho Area

Yaesu/Kyobashi Area

①Toeizan Kan'ei-ji Temple Kompon Chu-do

⑫⑬ Benten-do Temple

⑩⑪ Around Matsuzakaya Ueno

⑧⑨ Around Suehirocho Station

⑤⑥ Around Etoile Kaito Living Bldg.

①②③④ Around the Kyobashi Saiku
(Artizon Museum/TODA BUILDING)

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