SONY

Video Exhibition of Nozomi Hirai / Hiroto Minai / Caori Murata Transformation

I want someone to empathize with the feelings that shake my heart.

I want someone to understand the feelings that come back to me over and over again.

I can't help expressing the impulses that well up in me.

When I feel like doing something, my hand moves spontaneously.

I want to do something that no one has ever done before.

Many opportunities for expression present themselves to us. Cameras, video cameras and smartphones can be used as our eyes and hands to hold the brush. But what if we feel that the photos and videos we have taken do not fully express our feelings?
Can we do anything other than repeating the process again and again?
In this fourth exhibition of video works, we present a collection of works that have been created by converting a number of photographs into moving images,transforming live-action videos into paintings, skillfully mixing various other techniques, and exploring and creating images that transcend the boundaries of what we seek.
Expressive techniques are passed down from creator to creator; new usages and ideas are added; evolution continues. Evolution will continue without end,transcending the boundaries of people.
Although this is a collection of works inspired by expression techniques, we hope that while you are facing the screen in a dark room, you will not pay attention to the means, but rather surrender yourself to the world that is unfolding there. Let's share the world of expression in the year 2024.
Last, but not least, the gallery sincerely asks that you leave the young creators a warm message of encouragement, even if it is just a few words.

Nozomi Hirai Profile

Born in Fukuoka Prefecture. Majored in visual media at the Faculty of Art,Kyushu Sangyo University. While a student, he also worked on photographic expression, attempting to create works that fuse the characteristics of both.
Focusing on the chemical properties of the film itself, the exposure process and film being a light-sensitive material that can be touched in three dimensions, he has created many experimental works that combine arbitrariness and nonarbitrariness.
Moved to Tokyo in the spring of 2023. While being a studio worker at a white backdrop studio in Tokyo, he also belongs to an experimental film group based at a Theatre Image Forum. He has presented his works at the theater.

She Knows

When I communicate with a woman I like, I try to adorn and disguise the man I am.
I am afraid of showing my true self and her possible rejection of me.
A woman's intuition is always right.
A woman instinctively and cruelly quietly peels off the flimsy plating of the man in front of her.
As a result of being seen through and further faking it, I am no longer very receptive to the light that bounces off of her, invades my heart and even exposes my genes.
I am sure that these women are always hoping that I will recognize the chlorophy ll they have hidden in the back of their minds.

MY room moon

The sphere radiates motherhood.
Memories, of the sphere smoothly tracing my skin, warm and sometimes cold, appear unexpectedly in my mind. A dingy room where I live alone, far from my hometown.
The sound of water is strangely calming.
The shimmering surface of the water loosens my guard.
My body and mind waver and synchronize.

Hiroto Minai Profile

He is a seventeen-year-old junior currently attending Shotoku Gakuen High School.

In creating video works, he wants to move people's hearts without relying on words and is concerned with expressing subtlety in facial expressions and movements. In this work, fifteen images were taken to make a one-second movie. In the future, as an animator, he wants to create works that excite people around the world.

It gives me great pleasure to be the youngest artist to participate in this group exhibition. I hope you will be able to view our works. Thank you very much for your kind attention.

One eye and One AI

The story of a ghost who yearns for true love and a girl who has come to exterminate ghosts.

This work was created to project the feelings I have about my internal weaknesses and relationships into my artwork.

In the video, the preconceptions that arise between a human and a ghost, two beings who do not usually intersect,
and the aggression that arises from these preconceptions, were stripped of their prettiness; the bare emotions were
created to infuse meaning into the stage set, characters, composition, light and colors.

Caori Murata Profile

Born in Tokyo in 1994. She has been drawing pictures since she was a child and began creating animation while still in school. After graduating from Musashino Art University, she studied animation at the graduate school. Currently working as a freelance illustrator and animation creator, she is involved in commercial work such as music videos, commercials and illustration production.

A lover of foreign picture books since childhood, she first visited Cornwall, England a few years ago and was very impressed by Barbara Hepworth and her studio. She first visited Italy at a film festival in Ravenna, and later visited Alberobello, where she was attracted by the southern climate and landscape. Her language skills are poor; so, her goal is to become fluent in a foreign language. Another of her goals is to have a small studio abroad where she can live and visit different places while working on her productions and creations.

From the fabulous water

From one of the particles of life that fall from the universe,a human being is born.

This work centers around a portion of the Heavenly Arc of Dante's Divine Comedy.

I combined the theme of the birth of life with the allegory of the virgin conception and expressed it with the motif of the Tarot. The passage recited in this work is said to be the passage that represents Dante's birth. Heaven (Paradiso)is where Dante seems to leave this world and fly into space, but I imagine that the origin of life is invisible and exists like a particle in the universe, mixed with other stars and dust particles. The beginning of the universe, the birth of the stars and that we are alive today are the result of the accumulation of coincidences and processes, and no one can explain the reasons if asked why. Throughout history, people have constantly looked up to the sky,maybe because the source of our distant lives came fromthe sky far, far away.

The birth of life is an adventure in itself, an encounter with the unknown, and a touch of anxiety and fear are involved. The birth of something out of nothing. For example, one woman becomes a mother by conceiving life, nurturing the fetus from microscopic cells in the womb and bringing it into the world as a birth. Fear of the unknown, fear of change. To hold on to fear and wait for something to come. Mystery, hope, anxiety and fear. And beginnings. I created this work to express my wonder and respect for the birth of all life.

Animation of approximately 2 minutes with some rotoscoping
Music by Carlo Forlivesi
Recited by Emi Del Bene from the Heavenly Arc of Dante's Divine Comedy
Produced in 2021

A house by the sea

One cold morning I was to leave for a trip. I heard that a friend, whom I had promised to meet during my vacation, had disappeared for some time. Rumor had it that she was at the seaside, so I set out to look for her.

Fragments of memories and pieces of a seaside town intersect, reminding us of the poignancy of life, in this new video work with photographs, animation and images.

The video is approximately 6 minutes long.
Developed color film, digital, video and animation, poetry and lyrics
Grant for the production of poetry and lyrics: Arts Council
Tokyo, Tokyo Metropolitan Foundation for History and
Culture Reporting and production: Japan and UK
Filming locations include London, Cornwall, Tokyo,
Yokosuka and Anamizu Town.
Production: 2022