Great Japanese Artist Tatsumi Orimoto Brings His Bread-Man and Finger Dolls Performance to Hong Kong

Para/Site Art Space is honored to present two new performances by Tatsumi Orimoto. The Japanese artist will perform his Bread-Man series in the area around Graham Street Market on the 16th of January. On the following day, he will perform his Finger Dolls series at Para/Site Art Space.

This is the first time he performs in China, and for the occasion he will recreate Bread-Man, which is a historic street action that he started in 1991. This time a large group of unique Bread-Man will walk through the streets of Hong Kong.

Tatsumi Orimoto (1946, Kawasaki, Japan) is one the most renowned Japanese photographers and art performers. He moved to California where he studied at California Institute of the Arts, relocating later to New York where he was an assistant to Fluxus artist Nam Jun Paik. He participated in the Fluxus exhibition in New York, and later developed a collaborative work with Viennese Actionist Herman Nitsch. Ever since he went back to Japan in 1977, he has been devoting himself to his art works and the care of his elderly mother. This resulted in the project Art Mama, which has played a central role in the development of his later work as he started documenting the aging process of his Alzheimer’s mother.

His performances are connected to the everyday experience of life. Through Bread-Man, he has created an alter ego that represents modern life and how we relate to the Other in contemporary society. His corpus of works represents a profound existentialist preoccupation. Tatsumi Orimoto is himself a larger-than-life character, Bread-Man is at the same time tender and distant as it plunges us into the unknown through an object that brings many memories and recollections to the audience.

Finger Dolls, the other event that is taking place in Hong Kong, relates to his latest project in which a sculptural component is brought into life, as the Finger Dolls used in this performance are patiently crafted by the artist. Orimoto uses a common child toy and updates it into adult life.

Tatsumi Orimoto has exhibited in the Venice Biennial 2001, Yokohama Triennial 2001, Sharjah Biennial 2002, Busan Biennial 2002, Sao Paolo Biennial 2002 and B. Open at BALTIC Centre of Contemporary Art, among others. He lives and works with his mother in Kawasaki, Japan.