This project was the scenography of Japanese crafts exhibition organized by Japan craft design association (JCDA) at Maison de la culture du Japon (MCJP) in Paris. 233 created by many artists were displayed. They were made of various materials and techniques: glass, metal, bamboo, washi and jewelry, urushi, textile, etc., so as to bring a special feeling in everyday life.

We chose familiar spaces as the vital lead to display the crafts instead of setting them in formal white showcases like in a typical museum. It is not easy to imagine the way to use crafts at a glance. If we have displayed all them in a normal display case, most of them would appear as weird objects and lose their essential appeals. This is why we created daily life situations which matched up the objects and led visitors to understand easily the purpose of each object. The hall of MCJP where this exhibition was held is a huge public and industrial finished space, far from a cozy daily and familiar space. Our intervention was to regard the hall as a mansion: extracting several familiar scenes from the house and scattering them inside the hall of MCJP.

We have created 6 situations that suited 233 objects: staircase, study room, balcony, salon, dining space and dressing space. Each scene was composed by several iconic elements which reminded the visitor of familiar daily space: stairs, desk, window, couch, table, drawers, etc. All iconic elements of the scenography were covered by one homogenous color and texture, to create an ideological space. This narrative simplification had brought an apparent contrast between the scenography and the objects, to rise them to surface. The background icons and spaces were neutral and fanciful to let see the delicate treatment of materials in each exhibit.

Credit:
Organized by Japan craft design association (JCDA) and Maison de la culture du Japon in Paris (MCJP)
Directed by ARCHIEE / Yusuke KINOSHITA and Daisuke SEKINE and Kunihiko Takano
Photo Ryo Suzuki