A fan-made music video produced entirely through filming in VRChat.

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.

Discovered in the world of surrealism were Dongurizu, Shinichi Osawa, and a mirror ball.