This Year’s Theme
Docs: Images and Records

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A document is a record of fact-based information, traditionally in the form of words but more recently also as images such as photographs and moving images. The word “documentary,” meanwhile, has come to be used not only as an adjective meaning “factual” or “consisting of documents,” but also as a noun referring to a film expressing facts.

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The Lumière brothers’ Exiting the Factory (1895), which is a record of people leaving a factory, is widely recognized as the starting point of the history of motion pictures. People at the time were astonished to see scenes from their everyday lives being recorded and replayed before their eyes as if the events were actually happening right there. Today, 130 years after the invention of moving images, it is entirely unexceptional for people to record and share their daily lives through photographs and videos. Meanwhile, the definition of a photograph has been expanded to include digital images and that of moving images now encompasses digital video; in digital form, these media can be manipulated more freely than before, resulting in a more complex and ambiguous relationship between facts and the images that represent them. Held on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the Tokyo Photographic Art Museum, the Yebisu International Festival for Art & Alternative Visions 2025 will focus on the transformation of these media. By examining a wide range of works through the lens of images and words, the festival will pursue a reconsideration of documents and documentary.

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In the exhibition gallery on the 3rd floor, what lies in between documents and documentaries will be explored through new works by the finalists of the second edition of the Commission Project by focusing on differences in the artists’ personal, social, and historical backgrounds as well as in their approaches to the issue itself. The exhibition in the 2nd floor exhibition gallery will feature a group of works related to performance and the body in forms including moving images, photography, and documents, focusing on the recording of time while also delving into topics such as cultural diversity and archives. In the exhibition gallery on the basement floor, issues of words and images will be surveyed through diverse forms of expression from the nineteenth century to the present, including works from the Tokyo Metropolitan Government collection.

Off-site exhibitions held outside the museum will provide visitors with opportunities to experience works closely related to the theme. In addition, a program of screenings, performances, concerts, talk sessions, discussions, and workshops will be presented throughout the event period mainly in the 1st floor hall, enabling artists and visitors to reflect on the theme together.