■Date
July 26, 2025

■Venue
FabCafe Kyoto
554 Honshio-Gama-cho, Shimogyo-ku, Kyoto 600-8119, Japan

■Overview
This workshop explores the creative potential for co-creation that transcends the boundaries between art and research. By sharing case studies from practitioners across diverse fields, and by incorporating the dialogic methodology known as “Imaginary Dialogue”—which utilizes video and AI—we aim to open up new horizons for interdisciplinary collaboration.

Here, “practitioners bridging art and research” refers not only to artists who have developed creative practices in collaboration with researchers and scientists, but also to researchers and practitioners who, through co-creation with artists, have themselves come to engage in expressive approaches.

In recent years, there has been growing recognition of the need for art and science to collaborate on equal footing, rather than relegating art to a mere visualization tool for science. This awareness was also emphasized at the “RIHN-KLASICA Workshop” held in February 2025, hosted by RIHN, where the importance of building new and equitable relationships between art and science was actively discussed.
Reference: https://www.chikyu.ac.jp/matsuda.program/RIHN-KLASHICA%20WS.pdf

This workshop is initiated by Kenichi Sawazaki and Naho Yokoya, both of whom have conducted collaborative projects with researchers in various disciplines.

Sawazaki, a film director and artist, created the film “#manazashi” (dir. Kenichi Sawazaki, 124 min, 2016), produced during travels through Africa and Southeast Asia with field researchers. He has also explored how artistic expression can foster dialogue and understanding across cultural boundaries through projects such as “Young Muslim’s Eyes: Crosswork between Arts and Studies”, a collaborative effort with cultural anthropologists and young Muslims living in Japan.

Yokoya, a visual artist, has worked with cultural anthropologists in a project based in the vacant Fujikawa Residence in Shionoe, a mountainous region in Kagawa Prefecture. Through investigations into the “things,” “events,” and “memories” left in the house, she has sought to inherit the memory of those who once lived there. This work resulted in the publication of “Co-Creation of Art and Anthropology: Vacant House, Objects, Events, and Memory” (edited by Shiho Hattori, Tamaki Ono, and Naho Yokoya; Suiseisha, 2024).

In the second half of the workshop, participants will engage in a practice centered on the processes of dialogue and imagination, based on “Imaginary Dialogue”, a methodology co-developed by Sawazaki and the Liberal Arts Communicators at NIHU. This approach aligns with recent academic trends such as multimodal anthropology, science and technology studies (STS), and the environmental humanities.

Objectives
To generate emergent models of interdisciplinary co-creation among practitioners bridging art and research
To visualize new “questions” and “project frameworks” that transcend the boundaries between science and art
To experiment with and further develop socially collaborative models that integrate academic and cultural domains

Following the event, we plan to document and share outcomes such as project proposals, exhibition ideas, conceptual artworks, and common concerns that arise from the “Imaginary Dialogue” process (specific methods are still under discussion). These outputs—including project concepts, keyword clusters, and visual notes—will serve as a foundation for future dialogue and collaboration.

■Organizers
Kenichi Sawazaki (RIHN)
Naho Yokoya (Kyushu University)

■Hosted by
RIHN, NIHU, NIHU Pioneering and Promoting Co-Creation Project

■Co-organized by
Faculty of Design, Kyushu University