Theaster Gates: Afro-Mingei

Largest-ever solo exhibition in Japan by a Black artist

Theaster Gates: Afro-Mingei offers the priceless opportunity to experience major past works and never-seen-before new works created for this exhibition from a prominent practitioner of Black art, a domain that has been attracting growing interest from the international art world in recent years. The all-embracing content, including an introduction to the Black histories and cultures that underpin Gates’ practice, makes it the largest-ever exhibition of its kind to be staged in Japan. Featured is a substantial body of work, including a large-scale installation utilizing ceramics made in Tokoname and Gates’ own ceramic sculptures, collections of historical archival materials, tar paintings, sound installations, and video works.

Showcases Black history’s influence on contemporary culture, from the “Black Is Beautiful” movement to speculative futures envisaged by Gates

The Black craft practices, art, music, and fashion that have played major roles in past resistance to anti-Black discrimination and oppression including Black Lives Matter (BLM), now have a higher profile than ever before, thanks in part to Gates’ artistic interventions elevating histories of the past that others had written off. It indeed reflects a culture that has actively and creatively resisted centuries of racial violence and colonial exploitation. In Theaster Gates: Afro-Mingei, Gates’ multidisciplinary oeuvre will demonstrate the importance and emergence of Black culture today.

Presents Gates’ representative projects of spatial practices including architectural projects centered in Chicago

Theaster Gates: Afro-Mingei employs archival materials to introduce Gates’ world-renowned architectural interventions through one of his best-known projects: the Rebuild Foundation (2009-). Undertaken on Chicago’s South Side, a predominantly Black community that was intentionally isolated and denied equal right to property and city-wide investment, Gates, through Rebuild Foundation, has rescued over 40 buildings from abandonment, transforming them into spaces of public engagement with art and culture. The Foundation’s work includes archiving and presenting important collections of objects that chronicle Black history and culture. For example, Gates stewards and invites the community to witness and participate in the preservation of culturally and historically valuable objects from the archives of the Chicago-based Johnson Publishing Company (JPC), publishers of the widely circulated periodicals in the second half of the 20th century on Black life, Ebony and Jet magazines, and the personal collection of records of the late “Godfather of House Music” Frankie Knuckles (1955-2014), just to name a few.

New works and projects with a Japanese connection

Theaster Gates: Afro-Mingei features works that imagine, amalgamate and hybridize Black and Japanese historical and cultural elements, including the Black Vessel made in Tokoname, and work inspired by late Edo-period poet and ceramic artist Otagaki Rengetsu. In addition, a variety of projects on which Gates has collaborated with various makers from around Japan, including Nagano-based SANSUI-SHA, company that utilizes second-hand wood; SHOYEIDO INCENSE CO., a Kyoto-based, long-established incense shop; UJI TEA HORII SHICHIMEIEN; and a Nishijin textile company HOSOO will be presented.

“Black Library” book lounge right in the gallery

An interactive and participatory library with shelves filling the gallery walls has been created for the exhibition, offering visitors the chance to browse a few thousand publications on Black art, history and culture.

Full program of events including music and workshops

A diverse program of events designed to showcase the breadth of Gates’ practice is planned for the duration of the exhibition including on-site sonic activations, events featuring DJs, and an off-site installation at the former Earthenware Pipe Factory (Maruri-Toukan) in the city of Tokoname.