A letter offered to a form of life called a virus, in hopes of coexistence. From a new perspective, it poetically expresses the relationship between humans and viruses. Created from the desire to merge analog methods with VR technology and to showcase the appeal of animation in a more自由な spatial environment.

JACKSON kaki creates works about virtual reality, the metaverse, and art. In this exhibition, the artist presents a performance using VRChat in order to examine corpses in the age of virtual reality, and exhibits the recorded footage as the artwork. The metaverse has become such a common term that many people can readily imagine it. JACKSON kaki critically observes the business-oriented and tool-oriented metaverse, which is treated as a kind of utopia, and explores expression by connecting it to the body, space, society, and culture in physical space. This work focuses on the phenomenon of the “corpse.” In the metaverse, it is possible to express the body through avatars; unlike social media, which is built through the exchange of text, images, and video, it enables more immersive experiences and the formation of human relationships that differ from those in reality. The artist began this work by questioning how corpses are perceived and handled by humans in spaces where avatars are used. In many currently available metaverses, the “depiction” or “programming” of corpses has not been prepared. JACKSON kaki interprets this state as a culture in which awareness of and understanding of corpses has not been formed, or has in some sense regressed, and undertook this work as an artistic examination and practice of expression. As a means to this end, the artist creates a “story” that references ancient civilizations shaped by mythology and gods, and connects them to the contemporary metaverse. Based on that story, a “ritual” for handling corpses is constructed, and this ritual is performed and recorded. Through the body in performance within metaverse space and the “handling” of corpses, this work asks how we perceive and recognize corpses in the age of virtual reality.

We produced the opening video used for the 2022 VALORANT Champions Tour Challengers Japan Stage 2 – Playoff Finals, the official tournament for the tactical FPS game VALORANT, held at Saitama Super Arena. With Japanese teams achieving success on the world stage and the first offline tournament with a live audience being held, we aimed to create a work that evokes the “dawn” of Japan’s esports scene. In addition, drawing from “time,” an important element within VALORANT, we built anticipation for the start of the event with a countdown timer modeled after the in-game UI. By using footage and audio from past tournaments in chronological order, the piece suggests that time is gradually moving toward the present. As for the sound design, because this was a shooting game filled with intense exchanges and a large-scale offline tournament realized after overcoming the chaos of the COVID-19 pandemic, we placed greater emphasis than usual on aggressive sounds. Since this was the deciding match to determine Japan’s representative team, we incorporated chords that evoke a sense of Japanese harmony, as well as sounds sampled from instruments of gagaku, traditional Japanese court music.

As part of the “Media Arts Japanese Culture Promotion Project at Airports, etc.” organized by the Agency for Cultural Affairs, this work was exhibited in the “ETERNAL ~ A Thousand Seconds of Stillness” exhibition held at Haneda Airport. This work was created with inspiration from the production approach of the “Kirin Mon Mandala” designed by Sho-ryu and Yoji Hatoba. The technique of monshō-ue, in which circular emblems have been designed by combining perfectly round circles since the Edo period, as practiced by monshō-ue artist Mr. Hatoba, was applied to waveforms drawn through physical simulation by Seiichi Sega. Through the simple linear combination of variously sized circles, the work finds a sense of natural beauty and harmony, layering it over landscapes that seem to have arisen by chance, such as waves and terrain, and expressing the “moment of composition” in beauty. In response to the sound image by Kyoka, in which ripples are composed as a visualization of sound along the x, y, and z axes, a massive space surrounded by three screens was created.