TAIKAHOUNOU

The Japanese have been presenting offerings to the gods in various ways since ancient times. Ceremonies such as Kagura music and ritual dance have been used as a method to become one with the gods by making offerings through one’s body, inducing auditory hallucinations and illusions from a state of trance, and trying to communicate with them. In “Taikahounou”, we presented the body as an offering at the stone steps leading to the gates of Jochi-ji Temple, a Zen temple in Yamanouchi, Kamakura. That was a dance harnessed by the minds of our distant ancestors and enlivened by the gods’ grace. Just as if humans were not something which exists inside nature, but nature itself. The flesh faces a different ring of existence and moves to a new state. The body becomes a being which transforms into sharp beauty, like clear water that flows, or ice which returns with the purpose of offering. Through this work, we once again became aware of the fact that the flesh and the soul should exist together, and that the division of the mind makes us unhappy as humans. We obtained an intense delight in the original human form from bodily expression.