Daiwa Funded Project Exhibits at Architectural Association School of Architecture

Until 8 December the exhibition YATAI HERE YATAI THERE is being shown at the Front Room of the Architectural Association School of Architecture, Bedford Square, London. Opening hours are 10:00am – 7:00pm, Monday to Friday and 10:oo am to 3:00pm, Saturday. The Daiwa Anglo-Japanese foundation gave this project a small grant in 2012. This project was inspired by the the Japanese Embassy’s wish to create cultural links between people in London and Japan. This project began in direct response to the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011 and it was intended for direct engagement with the affected communities in the Tohoku region.

YATAI HERE YATAI THERE was first seen as a part of the International Architecture and Design Showcase, an initiative of the London Festival of Architecture and the British Council, and created with the festival theme, the Playful City, in mind.YATAI are Japanese mobile street stalls set up to sell food and other forms of merchandise in cities. The exhibition tells the stories of the journeys of a number of YATAI for the young and young at heart – mobile play-stations.

In YATAI HERE YATAI THERE (YHYT), specially constructed yatai purpose-built for recreation, are used as vehicles for seeing the city through the medium of play. These YATAI have travelled around London and to the north-eastern Tohoku region of Japan offering activities to young people on their way. Each YATAI has returned to the exhibition, each bringing back with it records of particular events and stories from its travels, which unfold as series of moving images, and traces made by the participants themselves to create a family of YATAI-making playful links between local communities over 9000 km apart.

YHYT Project Team: Shin EGASHIRA; Yuko ODAIRA; Shintaro TSURUOKA; Atsushi IWATA; Ann NII; Nozomi NAKABAYASHI; Xiong CHAN; Takako HASEGAWA; Kensuke HOTTA; Saki ICHIKAWA; Arata MORI (Cinematography-Filming); Sayaka NAMBA; Keita TAJIMA; Carolina VALLEJO; Simon WRIGHT; Yuma YAMAMOTO.

Taken from http://www.aaschool.ac.uk/PUBLIC/WHATSON/exhibitions.php