The Stuff of Dreams:
Miwa Yanagi's Limited-Edition
Midnight Awakening Dream for the Deutsche Guggenheim
In Midnight Awakening Dream, Japanese artist
Miwa Yanagi positions her 'elevator girls' panorama-like in an endless,
labyrinthine shopping arcade, at the end of which the uniformed young
women are found in a pile of tossed-aside designer clothes. The artist
creates an ideal space in which the borders between the inside and outside
world have fallen away and the secret desire for a disturbing reality
reveals itself. Yanagi says of Midnight Awakening Dream, "One simply
passes through most of the spaces that appear in dreams. And in reality,
one also simply passes through passageways and crossing-points - streets,
stairs, elevators, escalators, train platforms."
Fashion and
its social codes within Japanese culture are central themes in Miwa
Yanagi's work. As a young artist, she taught textile design at a primary
school in Kyoto. So it's not really a surprise that, on the occasion of
her exhibition at the Deutsche Guggenheim, she had Midnight Awakening
Dream printed on a 600-meter-long piece of cloth. The digital print on
transparent georgette is done with the same precision as the artist's
digital photography. This limited edition work will be sold by the meter
in the
MuseumsShop, thus changing from fashionable fabric to artwork.
Midnight Awakening Dream is the stuff of dreams, printed on a dreamy
sort of fabric. At the request of the Deutsche Guggenheim, the designers
for the Berlin clothing label Sai So
- which specializes in original kimono fabrics - have tried out the
various ways in which Miwa Yanagi's piece can be draped around the body.
The Japanese term "sai so" means 'to reconstruct' or 'reassemble.' That
seems a perfect description for the fabric version of Midnight
Awakening Dream, which, as a conceptual piece of art, crosses the
border between art that is one of a kind, and that which is produced in a
multiple series.
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Description:
Digital print on georgette (100% polyester)
Limited edition of 600 meters, signed upon label
Price: €120/meter, or
€105/meter for Guggenheim Club members
Translation:
Tanya Ott
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