The Matter of Facts
Date: August 2021 Location: Tokyo, Japan Function: Installation Status: Built Client: National Art Center, Tokyo Structural design: Yohei Tomioka, Takayuki Fujimoto Lighting design: Lighting Roots Factory Contractor: accomplish Supported by: Nomura Foundation Cooperated by: Robert Walters Japan
The Matter of Facts is an installation created for the National Art Center, Tokyo, responding to the global pandemic and the conditions of prolonged lockdown. The project uses printed matter as its primary material, treating it as a carrier of urban memory. The collected materials consist largely of public notices, event announcements, and promotional documents issued by public institutions and commercial venues across Tokyo, many of which relate to cancellations and postponements during the pandemic. Accumulated in large quantities, these fragments form a physical record of a disrupted period. The installation operates both as a means of communicating factual information and as a device for preserving traces of lived experience. Through this aggregation, the work reflects on how urban memory is shaped, recorded, and potentially lost. The project invites viewers to reconsider their own position within this shared context, situating personal experience within a broader collective condition. Commissioned by the National Art Center, Tokyo, the installation was realised with support from the Nomura Foundation and in cooperation with Robert Walters Japan.
The work is conceived as a means of prompting viewers to reconsider their present position through the accumulation of observable facts. Throughout history, societies have sought stability by constructing systems of belief to counter invisible forms of fear, such as those brought about by epidemics. Where such stability was once grounded in faith, it has, over time, been largely replaced by trust in scientific knowledge. This shift enabled a shared understanding of reality and provided a sense of social and psychological order. The emergence of COVID-19, however, exposed the fragility of this foundation. Scientific understanding, while essential, appeared provisional and subject to constant revision, contributing to a wider sense of uncertainty. Alongside this, the proliferation of unverified and contradictory information further destabilised public perception, generating an atmosphere of diffuse and persistent anxiety. In this context, the project turns to the accumulation of verifiable facts as a way to re-establish orientation. The Matter of Facts is composed of printed materials produced during and after the onset of the pandemic. These documents record events that took place, as well as those that were cancelled or altered, reflecting shifts across everyday life. By assembling these fragments into a collective field, the work constructs a record of change. It captures what disappeared, what emerged, and what remained, offering a perspective on the transformation of the urban environment. Through this process, the installation proposes a method of engaging with uncertainty: not by resolving it, but by situating oneself within a shared and observable reality.
