SINGAPORE – ArtScience Museum will be presenting Specters and Tourists, a moving image exhibition by Japanese filmmaker and artist, Daisuke Miyazaki, from 11 November to 17 December, in conjunction with this year’s Singapore International Film Festival (SGIFF).
Seen through the eyes of Miyazaki, Specters and Tourists is a two-part film installation commissioned by ArtScience Museum and SGIFF that depicts urban life, and scenes from Singapore. The isolation and anxiety of modern life is depicted in the first part of the experience, Specters, whilst Tourists reveals the temporary freedom that the protagonists experience in the absence of technology. Admission to Specters and Tourists, and the programs that accompany it, is free.
In Specters, scenes from Miyazaki’s previous films are weaved into a multiple-screen spectacle of people trapped like ghosts, or specters. Miyazaki lingers on the observation that the modern experience is homogenized and without meaning; without risk and thoroughly monotonous. As one peers into the windows of their uninspired lives, the spectator becomes the specter himself.
The accompanying installation is Tourists, which was filmed in Singapore. It stars Japanese actresses, Nina Endo (who starred in Miyazaki’s Yamato (California), which was screened at the 27th SGIFF) and Sumire Sato (from Japanese girl group, SKE48). In Tourists, two friends win a free trip abroad. They arrive in a cosmopolitan city identical to their home country, but find themselves displaced in its unfamiliar monuments when one of them loses her mobile phone. Without the predictability of a travel itinerary found on the Internet, the friends reconstruct their identities with their encounters in unwritten places.
Born in Yokohama, Japan in 1980, Miyazaki is the director of Yamato (California), which screened at SGIFF in 2016. He is also one of the Berlinale Talents directors of the omnibus film, 5 to 9, which screened at SGIFF in 2015. Miyazaki’s first feature film, End of the Night, was selected for numerous international film festivals and won the Special Mention Prize at the Toronto Shinsedai Cinema Festival.
Specters and Tourists is part of Marina Bay Sands’ ongoing extended collaboration as a Presenting Sponsor of the SGIFF. It sees ArtScience Museum and SGIFF collaborating to inspire audiences beyond the main film festival by exploring new spaces for the discovery of art, film and the moving image.
Honor Harger, Executive Director of ArtScience Museum, said, “We are thrilled to premiere this new film installation by one of Japan’s most impressive young filmmakers at ArtScience Museum, in collaboration with Singapore International Film Festival. Specters and Tourists is an extension of ArtScience on Screen, our platform for film, video and moving image which explores the intersection of art, science, culture and technology. Daisuke Miyazaki’s thoughtful and compelling film installation gives us a new view on Singapore, and encourages us to think about our urban environment in a more imaginative way.”
“As part of our commitment to championing our regional talents, the Singapore International Film Festival is excited to continue our collaboration with ArtScience Museum to provide additional platforms for Asian filmmakers to showcase their works. Daisuke Miyazaki has been a regular at the Festival, and it is really the next step for us to work with him on a multi-disciplinary exhibition that weaves together film, music and live performance, challenging the possibilities of how we use film to connect with our audience.” said Yuni Hadi, Executive Director of SGIFF.
In conjunction with Specters and Tourists, ArtScience Museum will be hosting performances and screenings, as part of the museum’s ongoing program strands, ArtScience Late and ArtScience on Screen. ArtScience Late brings experimental performances by outstanding local and international performers who work at the intersection of art, technology and science, to the public. ArtScience on Screen is the museum’s dedicated film and video program, and is part of Marina Bay Sands’ ongoing commitment to local and international film culture.
ArtScience Late: ARE and Daisuke Miyazaki (16 November)
On 16 November at 8pm, Miyazaki will be directing an immersive and exuberant ArtScience Late performance, All Life is Tour, in partnership with Singapore musicians, ARE. Sound project and art rock band, ARE create psych-art arrangements that sway between loud guitars, colouful electronics and lyrical tales. They have performed and recorded their melodic psychedelia and grainy electronics in Japan and Singapore, in locations as diverse as museum and abandoned houses.
All Life is Tour will combine improvised music and live cinema to allow visitors to experience life as both specter and spectator.
Admission is free, on a first-come-first-served basis with limited capacity at the performance.
ArtScience on Screen: 5 to 9 (5 November – 5 December 2017)
ArtScience Museum will also be screening 5 to 9, a collaborative film by four regional directors – Tay Bee Pin (Singapore), Daisuke Miyazaki (Japan), Vincent Du (China) and Rasiguet Sookkarn (Thailand). First premiered in Singapore at the 26th SGIFF, 5 to 9 comprises four short stories that transpire and interweave from 5pm to 9am on the evening of the historic Brazil-Germany match during World Cup 2014, spanning intimate vignettes of unrequited love and final meetings.
The screening will take place between 5 November and 5 December 2017. Admission is free. For screening schedule, please visit MarinaBaySands.com/ArtScienceMuseum
Both the performance and the additions screenings are held in conjunction with Specters and Tourists, co-organized by ArtScience Museum and Singapore International Film Festival.
