Open Call | Performance: Sculptural Rebirth by Tadasu Takamine
Tadasu Takamine, Sculptural Rebirth, 2023, Performance at the Former Daiichi Bank, Yokohama, Japan, Photo: Courtesy of the Artist
Exciting paid opportunity for students to participate in a performance at the Vancouver Art Gallery, directed by Tadasu Takamine!
Artist Tadasu Takamine will be visiting Vancouver from Japan to direct a performance, Sculptural Rebirth, at the Vancouver Art Gallery on March 2, 2025. The performance involves working closely with local art student participants.
During the event, six students will sit while drawing a posed model. Each will have an opportunity to speak about themselves to the audience, before being covered in plaster. When the plaster has set, they will break free and emerge, suggesting the experience of transformation as one sheds an ill-fitting skin and moves on to a new phase.
Watch a previous version of Tadasu Takamine’s Sculptural Rebirth performance here »
The performance is organized by the Vancouver Art Gallery with the generous support of Emily Carr University of Art + Design and their NSERC Mobilize grant. It is directed by artist Tadasu Takamine and curated by Makiko Hara, Curator in Residence.
Deadline to apply: February 17, 2025
Interested in participating? To apply, contact Professor Emily Hermant by email at ehermant@ecuad.ca.
Your email should indicate which position you are applying for and include one or two sentences explaining your interest and any relevant skills you would bring to the position.
The Opportunity
Six (6) students will be hired as performers to be safely covered in plaster during the performance, while an additional six (6) students will be hired to assist in the plastering process.
There are also two (2) other opportunities for student roles in the performance: someone who can perform the role of life model and recite text, as well as someone to bring the microphone to each speaker.
Students will be paid by ECUAD for their time (approximately 21 hours, including orientation sessions and rehearsals) at the current hourly rate for Research Assistants.
Rehearsal Schedule
Orientation Session
Date: TBC
Time: TBC (2 hours)
Location: ECUAD
Introductions and Project Orientation
Date: Tuesday, February 25, 2025
Time: 4–8 PM
Location: ECUAD
Casting Rehearsal #2
Date: Friday, February 28, 2025
Time: 4–8 PM
Location: Vancouver Art Gallery
Dress Rehearsal
Date: Saturday, March 1, 2025
Time: 9:30 AM–1:30 PM
Location: Vancouver Art Gallery
Prep, Final Walkthrough with the Artist and Performance at 2 PM
Date: Sunday, March 2, 2025
Time: 11 AM–5 PM
Location: Vancouver Art Gallery
Eligibility Requirements for All Participants:
- Participants MUST be able to attend all practice/info sessions, rehearsals, and the live performance as scheduled.
- Participants MUST agree to the release of video and photographs taken during the performance.
- This call is open to current Emily Carr University of Art + Design students only.
Eligibility Requirements for Performers:
- Participants should be comfortable being partially clothed (see photo above) and willing to remove some body hair to prevent it from getting caught in the plaster. Plaster will be applied to the body, but a protective barrier will limit its direct contact with the skin. Nevertheless, anyone with skin sensitivities should not apply.
- Life drawing experience is preferred but not required.
- Participants must be able to sit still for up to 45 minutes, with the support of a stick, during the period in which their body is covered in plaster. They should also be comfortable bearing the weight and moderate heat of the plaster as it sets.
- Participants should be comfortable speaking to the audience about themselves before their body is covered in plaster.
- Open to all ECUAD students. No prior performance experience or skills required.
Eligibility Requirements for Plaster Casting Assistants:
- Comfort plastering the Performers before a live audience.
- Experience working with plaster.
Eligibility Requirements for Microphone Handler:
- Comfortable performing in public to a live audience.
- The moderator will assist by holding the microphone while the performers share their stories and help move the easels during the performance.
Eligibility Requirements for Life Drawing Model / Recitation of Texts:
- In the first half of the performance, the participant will serve as the life drawing model for approximately 30 minutes (seated position, clothed).
- In the second half of the performance, the participant will recite quotations from the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche for about 10 minutes.
- Participants should be comfortable performing in public to a live audience.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Tadasu Takamine 高嶺格 was born in 1968 in Kagoshima, Japan and is based in Tokyo. He employs various media including video, installation and stage performance to reveal buried social issues, often engaging with his own body and personal experiences. Takamine has developed his unique experimental live installation-performance practices through workshops with local participants over several decades, which he incorporates in much of his recent artwork.
Takamine’s works can be laced with a sense of pain and frustration and are deeply personal. Often placing audiences in uncomfortable situations, Takamine calls into question their sense of belonging, while conveying through untrained awkward bodies, an underlying warm, naive humanity that longs for others.
Takamine’s work is highly acclaimed in both Japan and abroad. Solo exhibitions include Too Far to See, Ikon Gallery, Birmingham, England, 2011; Cool Japan, Mito Art Centre, Japan, 2012; Japan Syndrome, Utrecht, Netherlands, 2013; and Brothers, TKG Gallery, Taipei, Taiwan, 2016. Takamine has also participated in the Venice Biennale, 2003; Busan Biennale, 2004; Asian Pacific Triennale, 2012; and Aichi Triennale in 2019. Takamine was the Audain Visual Artist in Residence at SFU School for the Contemporary Arts in 2018 and is currently the professor and Chair of the Sculpture Department at Tama Art University, Tokyo.