Japanese Tea Project

I started MMC, Minimum Movement Catalog, an online movement lexicon, as a way to research my roots, my Japanese-ness, through body language by archiving movements from the West and East and examining each movement language's kinetic and symbolic meaning.

Even though I thought MMC was very Japanese, many people didn't recognize any "Japanese-ness" in it. For example, there was a movement coming from traditional Japanese dance in MMC. I wondered if the movement was performed in Kimono, if people would recognize it as "Japanese." Since I performed in black sweats, people saw it as an abstract movement. Was this because there was a lack of cultural context? It seemed the audience needed explanations about which parts were "Japanese."  Because of this experience, I became interested in how cultural symbols work. I wanted to ask what makes people (or even me, Maho) think something is Japanese. Also, I wanted to examine both my Japanese-ness and what I didn't know about Japanese culture objectively.

So, in 2022, I started researching Japanese Tea Culture for its formality and concept. 

2022~ongoing

Awards for this project:

Foundation for Contemporary Arts Emergency Grant (2024)