Space, a satellite venue of the Towada Art Center in Aomori, hosted “#spread,” a solo exhibition by the London- and Kyoto-based artist Noriko Okaku.

Born in Kyoto in 1979, Noriko Okaku has a strong interest in transcendental forces and the principles that constitute the world. Her artistic practice involves blending theoretical frameworks such as philosophy, theology, quantum mechanics, and information thermodynamics with stories and ideas from folklore, myths, legends, and the occult. Her interdisciplinary methodology draws on a variety of genres, combining traditional forms of handmade expression such as collage and animation with cutting-edge technology including VR and AI to weave together a unique artistic world with a dynamic sense of perspective and scale.

I was involved in organizing Okaku’s 2016 exhibition “The Interpreter” and the dance performances related to it, held in various locations in Tokyo, and as a referee nominated her for the “VOCA Exhibition 2019” (The Ueno Royal Museum, Tokyo). I did so out of my great appreciation for Okaku’s practice, which is supported by her extraordinary inquisitiveness and passion, as well as eccentricity and humor capable of shaking up a rigid nervous system.

In addition, as the result of planning by Okaku herself, the Towada Art Center and the city of Towada organized the “Big Women” series of film screenings on August 17. Curated by Sarah Lucas, a leading representative of the Young British Artists (YBAs) in London, the program features the work of female artists over the age of 40, and this showing marked its debut in Japan. I hope this multifaceted and rewarding program will continue to inspire not only women but also minorities who have previously been ignored in art history.

Installation view, Noriko Okaku “#spread” 2024　photo: Kuniya Oyamada

The exhibition venue originated as the work “space” (2021), in which the artist Mé converted an abandoned building into an exhibition space, and it has been used as a satellite venue for the museum since 2022. The building used to have a “snack” bar on the first floor and a residence on the second floor, and has been a familiar part of the cityscape for many years. In its current appearance it evokes some strange distortion in time and space, with an abrupt opening in the exterior wall through which the white cube inside and the sky beyond are both visible, resembling a pocket dimension.

Okaku was struck by the unusual nested structure of the setting, consisting of a space in the form of someone else’s artwork and work that exists within it, and drew inspiration from the passage “Language is a virus from outer space” by the Beatnik writer William Burroughs. Here, Burroughs’s “outer space” is taken to mean an “external place” rather than the cosmos. Furthermore, the artist suggests that “one may be able to find a link between the Beat Generation, which rejected materialism and sought a connection with the spiritual world, and the present move away from the material and toward data.”

Installation view, Noriko Okaku “#spread” 2024　photo: Kuniya Oyamada

When entering the installation space from the outside, viewers passed through a panel marked “Entrance” and with a human shape cut out of it like a keyhole. This introduction suggested the biology of viruses, which enter and infect a host’s body by matching their surface molecule with the host cell’s receptor, like a key fitting into a lock. Meanwhile, various words were scattered across the floor at random, and a drawing resembling a conceptual map occupied a symbolic place on one of the walls.

The viewer was prompted to face a microphone and speak their name. An AI would then generate an image of the digital “space” along with accompanying caption text. The results were displayed on a monitor, and  were “spread” by being automatically uploaded onto the exhibition’s official Instagram account*.

Installation view, Noriko Okaku “#spread” 2024　photo: Kuniya Oyamada

Installation view, Noriko Okaku “#spread” 2024　photo: Kuniya Oyamada

As Okaku points out, the timing of our entry into the building and the names we enter may seem random, but they are actions based on the individual circumstances of each person, constituting minimal units of pure personal data. Incoherent images and text mutated by AI are replaced according to an algorithm, on the basis of causal relationships in past data. In other words, the image displayed for you on the monitor is based on all the previously generated results as well as your own data, and the next person to visit will also experience the work based on the results input by themselves and those of all previous viewers. The work is formed by the circumstances of each individual interacting with each other.

Scrolling through the official Instagram* feed, one could see “space” being updated and changing every day. Individual data encroaching on the data of the next visitor, and the two connecting while having an infinite influence on each other… One is overwhelmed by this beautiful yet eerie scenery.

My “space,” by the way, turned out to be a building with small, unevenly spaced rooms having multiplied like pimples, and despite recognizing that I’ve lived a reasonably long life and gone through a lot, I couldn’t help but smile wryly at the distortion of fate linked to my name. I tried typing in “Sting” next, and just like that, the image changed into a sleek, neat glass cube. Other images included an egg-shaped spaceship, a labyrinth that trapped a mountainous landscape, and a box with a giant gun floating in it—all of which made me wonder what circumstances had produced them.

On August 18, Okaku gave a lecture performance and held a workshop about “#spread” in the public area of the museum. The lecture performance saw the artist delve into the concept and considerations behind her work, sprinkling in keywords from the conceptual map displayed in the exhibition space while going through the archive of images generated during the exhibition period. In a startling climax, Okaku stood up and danced to musical-style songs composed by AI, with lyrics drawn from the incomprehensible text generated as captions for the images.

A playlist featuring a select few of these songs has been made public, and I implore you to give it a listen*. In the same vein as the “space” images, which flourish in an orderly but mad way, this is refined music that bears listening to, with lyrics that seem understandable in places but whose context escapes you—like rap in which your native language is mixed with foreign words—emanating the strangeness of causal relationships that cannot be explained by reason or logic.

In the workshop, participants made patches with the letters in their names—names being one of the key elements of the project and highly original data—and then exchanged them one by one to have the results printed on T-shirts. The creative process of giving shape to your own unique name and entrusting it to someone else involved part of your name being “spread” as part of someone else. This made for a truly eye-opening experience that allowed participants to physically grasp the idea behind the work, namely that any piece of language or action can become information that has an impact on the future.

Installation view, Noriko Okaku “#spread” 2024　photo: Kuniya Oyamada

As Okaku explained, the seemingly random circulation of cause and effect that goes in a social environment has thus far been considered a process operated exclusively by human beings, but this circulation of natural things and information, which appears random to us due to its scope being beyond our comprehension, is in fact controlled by the law of cause and effect. Additionally, AI has come to intervene in this circulation. Our generation is standing at a pivotal turning point. Solutions derived by AI for people living a century or two from now, in a society where humans and AI coexist, will undoubtedly be based on our inputs. At this very moment, we hold the key to the “archives” that could become the foundation of future society.

This project grew out of Okaku’s interest in the ecology of viruses, which coexist with, prosper through, and at times threaten humans all over the world. Just as viruses invade host cells and multiply, words and thoughts also have an impact on humans and can cause infection. What “#spread” reminds us of is that now, with the power of digital technology in the form of AI, words and thoughts continue to circulate far into the future while undergoing endless mutations, and that this is a process nobody can stop.

Since returning to Tokyo from Towada, I’ve been experiencing a creeping sense of introspection, writhing in fear at the tiny “seeds” contained in the words I’ve been writing and speaking without particular care or thought. Meanwhile, I can’t help but reflect on the significance and responsibility of a publication that aims to be a neutral “archive of criticism” free of external influence—and strive to live up to this ideal.

Translated by Ilmari Saarinen

*Playlist

!https://soundcloud.com/towada_sapce/sets/spread-playlist

Official Instagram account for Noriko Okaku: “#spread”
@towada_space
https://www.instagram.com/towada_space/