FADO is pleased to present the Toronto premiere of Japanese performance artist Mimi Nakajima. Her performance takes place in conjunction with the 4th 7a*11d International Festival of Performance Art, and is presented in FADO's International Visiting Artists series along with Japanese artist Shin-Ichi Arai.

Shin-Ichi Arai and Mimi Nakajima are part of a recent trend in Japanese performance art toward a rawer, more direct style that eschews the formalism and romanticism of an earlier generation. While traces of the poetic influence remain, these artists' works reveal their interest in casting an unblinking eye on our bodies as a site of social tension.

In relation to her work Wind doesn't blow branches, Mimi Nakajima writes:

"My performances develop from problems in my daily life, which I try to observe in an optimistic way. As I start to find the truth of a question, my thinking moves toward philosophic conclusion, the territory of 'reason'. If I bring my conclusions back to reality, it creates a funny gap. That is what I want to express in performance. There is always some 'vagueness' in trying to clarify truth. It is quite difficult to express the vagueness itself, but I find performance a useful means of accepting it. In performance art, people experience discovery through sharing time and place."

[Photos by Paul Couillard]