Yasukichi Murakami
Through a Distant Lens
“…a compelling and always absorbing work…” STAGE NOISE
We take so many photographs. How do we know which ones are important, which ones matter?
After a sell out season at Darwin Festival and rave reviews at Shinju Matsuri Festival Broome, OzAsia Festival Adelaide, and Sydney's Griffin Theatre Company, Mayu Kanamori's multilayered work Yasukichi Murakami - Through a Distant Lens returned to the stage at Riverside Theatres Parramatta in March 2016.
Kanamori goes in search of the missing photographs of Yasukichi Murakami - a Japanese-Australian photographer, entrepreneur and inventor, who lived in northern Australia from 1897 until his internment in 1941 - in order to tell the largely forgotten story of the early Japanese in Australia. Utilising photographic and video projections, sound design, live music and actors, photographs come to life in a conversation between a photographer from the past and one from the present.
“…a dramaturgically crystalline and ultimately moving meditation on place, photography and the politics of recognition.” REAL TIME
Written by Mayu Kanamori
Directed by Malcolm Blaylock
Music/Sound Design Terumi Narushima
Dramaturg Jane Bodie
Visual Design Mic Gruchy
Lighting Design Benjamin Brockman
Performed by Arisa Yura & Kuni Hashimoto
with Yumi Umiumare (video)
Musician Terumi Narushima
Watch the TRAILER
Read the REVIEWS
This project is assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory body; Creative Ecologies Lab, Media, Music, Communications and Cultural Studies, Macquarie University; the Northern Territory Government; the Japan Foundation and Playwriting Australia. Thanks also to our individual supporters.
