BIENNALE
2025

- Installation
- Video
Nalaka Wijewardhane: Contingent Footsteps — Mapping the Unthinkable in Tokyo
EVENTS
Workshop
Sanpo
Venue
Nihonbashi/Bakurocho Area
Etoile Kaito Living Bldg.
1-15-15 Higashikanda, Chiyoda-ku
Date
18:00–20:30
Free
Registration required (10 max)
A workshop by Nalaka Wijewardhane, a biennale artist.
Wijewardhane, inspired by Quentin Meillassoux’s concept of hyper-chaos, has been wandering through the streets of Tokyo, capturing the unimaginable with his camera.
In this workshop, participants will join a silent walk through the city, sensing a “space of contemplation” shaped by contingency, absence, and non-human presences. By rethinking everyday spaces, sounds, and objects as independent existences beyond human centrality, participants will share in the experience of a dérive—a wandering in which the city subtly engages the body and guides perception.
This is a rare opportunity to attentively engage with the faint uncertainties embedded in everyday life and to perceive the city of Tokyo from entirely new angles. Listen to the subtle voices and traces of the urban environment, and allow your body to experience the city in ways that go beyond ordinary observation. We warmly invite you to join this unique exploration.
Workshop Flow
Notes
Map
2 min walk from JR Sobu Line Bakurocho Sta. (Ex. 4)
6 min walk from Toei Shinjuku Line Bakuroyokoyama Sta. (Ex. A1)
Photo by Anuruddhika Padukkage
Nalaka Wijewardhane is a Sri Lankan filmmaker, visual artist, and academic whose work explores postcolonial memory, representation, and the sensory power of moving images. A lecturer at the University of Colombo and a doctoral researcher, his focus on colonial-era ethnographic films informs his practice. Nalaka’s poetic, experimental works combine archival footage, soundscapes, and non-linear narratives to challenge inherited gazes and evoke unseen histories. Rooted in South Asian and Buddhist contexts, his films and installations investigate how cultural identities are constructed and mediated, offering new ways of seeing, remembering, and imagining the past.
Nihonbashi/Bakurocho Area
Etoile Kaito Living Bldg.