Hotel Le Bois des Chambres & Restaurant Le Grand Chaume
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2011 art season
Historic Grounds

08. Tadashi Kawamata

"Promenade sous les arbres"

published at 04/02/2021
In his creations at Chaumont-sur-Loire, Tadashi Kawamata plays with the relations of scale, completely immersing visitors in nature and making them privy to a new way of understanding the landscape.
 
With this Promenade sous les arbres ("Connecting terrace"), the artist invites visitors to walk “from tree to tree”. He constructs wooden walkways, pathways beneath the cedars, giving another dimension to the perception of the natural surrounding space and providing a poetic area for rest and meditation.

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

Tadashi KAWAMATA
JAPAN

Tadashi Kawamata is a Japanese visual artist who was born in 1953 on the island of Hokkaido. Nowadays, he lives and works in Tokyo and Paris.
He very quickly made a name for himself on both the Japanese and international artistic scene. Already, at the age of 28, as a young graduate of the Tokyo Fine Arts University, he was invited to the Japanese Pavilion at the 1982 Venice Biennale. From then on, he has been involved in work all over the world, creating architectural projects, which always fit in perfectly with the site they adorn.
His work provides a reflection on social context and human relations. When he installed shelters made of recycled materials (wood, cardboard) on the outskirts of the cities of Montreal, New York or Tokyo, he was making references to shantytowns and the homeless. In Alkmaar, it was people with social problems who were associated with a walkway project, linking the community reintegration centre to the city. In all his projects, the artist surrounds himself with students, local inhabitants and groups who get involved in setting up and creating the work.
Urban planning issues are the basis of his work. Building or demolition sites, intermediate areas that survive in the urban space are taken over by the artist who uses the materials already on the site for his constructions, by “recycling” them (chairs, boats, scaffolding). Thus, in Kassel, it was a ruined church, destroyed by the Second World War and neglected when the city was rebuilt, which he gave back to the citizens at the time of Documenta VIII in 1987. Time, as an indicator of the greatness or decline of a building or a site, is a key element in his work.
His interventions recreate bridges between past and present, revealing the emotional side of things which cannot be seen, but also their material reality. Sharing work and reflecting on the living community, which brings life to each of his projects and is their foundation, encourage the awakening of this memory.
 

Tadashi Kawamata is represented by: Kamel Mennour Gallery, Paris.

Public Collections

Adviescommisie voor Beeldene Kunst/Centraal Museum, Utrecht, The Netherlands
Benesse Corporation, Naoshima, Japan
Canadian Center for Architecture, Monteal, Canada
City of Palma de Majorque, Majorque, Spain
Deutsche Bank, Tokyo, Japan
Fonds Régional d’Art Contemporain, Orléans, France
Fundació Sa Nostra, Majorque, Spain
Gemeentemuseum Den Haag, The Netherlands
Hara Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan
Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art, Hiroshima, Japan
Hokkaido Asahikawa Museum of Art, Asahikawa, Japan
Ishinomaki Cultural Center, Ishinomaki, Japan
Itami City Museum of Art, Itami, Japan
Iwaki City Art Museum, Iwaki, Japan
Kawaguchi Museum of Contemporary Art, Kawaguchi, Japan
Kitakyushi Municipal Museum of Art, Kitakyushi, Japan
Kiyosato Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan
Kunsthaus, Zug, Switzerland
McMaster Museum of Art, McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada
Meguro Museum of Art, Tokyo, Japan
Musée Cantini, Marseille, France
Musée d’Art Contemporain, Montreal, Canada
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, USA
National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, Canada
Neue Galerie, Staatliche und Städtische Kunstsammlungen, Kassel, Germany
Nissei Comprehensive Technical Center, Chiba, Japan
Osaka National museum of contemporary art, Osaka, Japan
Roosevelt Island Operating Corporation, New York, USA
Setagaya Art Museum, Tokyo, Japan
Shizuoka Prefectural Museum of Art, Shizuoka, Japan
Staatsgalerie Moderner Kunst, Munich, Germany
Tagawa Museum of Art, Tagawa, Japan
Takamatsu City Art Museum, Takamatsu, Japan
Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum, Tokyo, Japan
Toyota Municipal Museum of Art, Toyota, Japan
Umeda Sky Building, Osaka, Japan
Walter A. Bechtler Foundation, Herrliberg, Switzerland

Complete biography

The Domain of Chaumont-sur-Loire

Aquired by the Centre-Val de Loire Region in 2007, The Domain of Chaumont-sur-Loire has become an unmissable site within the spheres of art and gardens. The triple identity of the Domaine : Heritage, art and gardens make for a unique visit within the circuit of the Loire Valley castles

Domain of Chaumont-sur-Loire
41150 Chaumont-sur-Loire
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