This visual concert marks the first collaboration among visual artist SHIGA Lieko; Merzbow, a noise project by AKITA Masami; Balázs PÁNDI, a drummer who worked with AKITA on the album Cuts; and Richard PINHAS, who pioneered experimental rock in France from the 1970s onward and continues to work as an author and guitarist. The layered, improvised sounds created by the three musicians blend with SHIGA’s new videos, which are edited live. Shaping SHIGA’s work is a focus on pursuing the relationship between society and nature, thinking about life through imagining death, and, since the Great East Japan Earthquake, exploring the inner reality of the madness of the human mind and body that continues to be suppressed by the earthquake reconstruction plan promoted by the national government and big corporations. Hearing the music resonate in a spacious theater, not through a pair of headphones, and seeing the images come into view across an expansive screen, not just a smartphone in your hand, is something that opens up entirely new experiences .

“Merzbow, Balázs Pándi & Richard Pinhas with Lieko Shiga: ‘Bipolar’” was produced for Japan Foundation’s International Creations in Performing Arts 2022.
https://www.jpf.go.jp/e/project/culture/perform/creation/2022/index.html

Organized by: Kyoto Experiment and Kyoto Performing Arts Center at Kyoto University of the Arts
Co-Organized by: The Japan Foundation
Co-Produced by: Kyoto Experiment, Kyoto Performing Arts Center at Kyoto University of the Arts and The Japan Foundation
Performers: Merzbow, Balázs PÁNDI and Richard PINHAS
Video Creation and Live Editing: SHIGA Lieko
Video Shooting and Editing Technincal Support:SATO Takahiro
Camera Assistant: OHKUBO Motoki, KURIHARA Yusuke, CHIBA Dai, NAGASAKI Yoshitomo and FUKUDA Misato
Performers (Video): ARIMURA Maki, IWAMA Tomonori, KIKUCHI Soutaro, KUDO Natsumi, KURIHARA Yusuke, SAITO Harumichi, TAKAHASHI Manabu, NAKAMURA Yuki and MORIYAMA Manami
Stage Manager: OTA Kazushi (KPAC)
Sound: NISHIKAWA Bunsho, FUKAMI Hokuto and KIRIHARA Madoka
Lighting: TAKADA Masayoshi (RYU)
Technical Support: MORITA Ryo
Production Manager: GOTO Takanori and KAWAHARA Miho (KPAC)

Filmed at Kyoto Art Theater Shunjuza on October 8, 2022.
Producers of the film: The Japan Foundation, Kyoto Experiment
Archive Film by: slide//show
Director of Photography: Kim Song-Gi, MATSUMI Takuya
Camera Operation: NAKAMURA Ippei, Kim Song-Gi, FUKUOKA So, MATSUMI Takuya
Editor: KAWASAKI Maya

End date of distribution: 19/01/2026

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