Mercedes-Benz Art Scope 2018 – 2020

Since 2003, the Hara Museum has partnered with Mercedes-Benz Japan in the Art Scope artist-in-residence program which invites young artists from Japan and Germany to live in and draw inspiration from a different cultural environment. In 2018, the Japanese artist Tsuyoshi Hisakado was sent to Berlin for the 2018-2020 program and from Germany, the Cypriot artist Haris Epaminonda was sent to Tokyo in 2019. This exhibition presents the fruits of their respective experiences, as well as new works by a previous Art Scope participant, Meiro Koizumi (Berlin, 2010). All artists are presenting new work that addresses the current situation, made during a time of social and physical constraints.

Participating Artists

Tsuyoshi Hisakado

Born in 1981 and lives in Kyoto, Hisakado received an M.F.A. in sculpture at Kyoto City University of Arts in 2007. His major exhibitions in recent years include Aichi Triennale 2016, Culture City of East Asia 2017 Kyoto: Asia Corridor Contemporary Art Exhibition, MAM Project 025 (Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, 2018) and the 58th Venice Biennale International Exhibition May You Live in Interesting Times. In 2016, he created the stage design for chelfitsch’s Time’s Journey Through a Room which was performed worldwide. In 2019, his debut theater work Practice of Spiral was staged at ROHM Theatre Kyoto as part of the Kyoto Experiment: Kyoto International Performing Arts Festival. Hisakado’s first large-scale solo exhibition in Japan Practice of Spiral opened at the Toyota Municipal Museum of Art in March 2020.

Haris Epaminonda

Born in Nicosia, Cyprus in 1980 and lives in Berlin, Epaminonda studied at the Royal College of Art and Kingston University in England. In 2013, she was one of four artists shortlisted for Germany’s preeminent art prize, the Preis der Nationalgalerie. She represented Cyprus at the 52nd Venice Biennale in 2007 Old earth, no more lies, I’ve seen you … and the 58th Venice Biennale May You Live in Interesting Times where she won the Silver Lion for a Promising Young Participant. She has also contributed to many other international exhibitions such as the Berlin Biennale (2008) and dOCUMENTA 13 (2012) in Kassel, Germany. In Japan, she participated in the group exhibition The Kaleidoscopic Eye: Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary Collection at the Mori Art Museum in 2009.

Meiro Koizumi

Born in Gunma, Japan in 1976 and lives in Yokohama, Koizumi graduated from International Christian University and studied at Chelsea College of Art and Design (London). His past solo exhibitions include MAM Project 009 Koizumi Meiro at Mori Art Museum, Tokyo (2009), Projects 99: Meiro Koizumi at The Museum of Modern Art, New York (2013), Trapped Voice Would Dream of Silence, Arts Maebashi, Maebashi, Japan (2015) and Battlelands at Perez Art Museum Miami (2018). Group shows include Art Scope 2009-2011: Invisible Memories, Hara Museum of Contemporary Art (2011), Future Generation Art Prize 2012, Pinchuk Art Center, Kiev (2012), Demarcation, Ginza Maison Hermès Le Forum, Tokyo (2015), the 12^th Shanghai Biennale (2018) and Sharjah Biennial 14, UAE (2019). His works are included in numerous collections all over the world. His VR-incorporated theater work Prometheus Bound was presented at Aichi Triennale 2019.

About Mercedes-Benz Art Scope
This program was launched in 1991 under the name Art Scope and the Hara Museum has been a partner since 2003. Starting with the present exhibition, the program has been renamed Mercedes-Benz Art Scope.
As its main points, the program seeks to promote the development of contemporary art and the exchange of culture between Japan and Europe by providing an artist-in-residence experience of approximately 3 months in Berlin for Japanese artists and in Tokyo for German artists, and organizing and holding a group exhibition featuring the participating artists at the Hara Museum to present the results of their experience.
In addition to the name change, it was decided that one past participant of the program would be invited as a guest artist. It was thought that by showcasing the recent work of past participants, a light would be shone on the trajectory of their post-residence careers, and therefore on the program’s history and evolution of more than a quarter of a century.