MUNCH invites you to the spectacular 4 April opening of Kiyoshi Yamamoto’s You Are What You Is – a sensory experience in which visitors play a starring role. Known for his colourful, norm-busting artistry, Yamamoto will transform the museum into a living stage where fabrics, light and movement fuse into a dynamic narrative.
Theatrical Textiles
At the heart of the exhibition, we find a monumental textile work stretched across the longest wall of the 10th floor gallery at MUNCH. This vibrantly coloured work swirls open and closed in a well-choreographed dance, its shifting colours enhanced by the lighting. Visitors can go behind the silk fabric and interact with it in the intimate space to the rear, which sets up a uniquely physical relationship. Yamamoto draws parallels with children’s hide-and-seek games – where you can feel both safely concealed and tense with excitement.
Tone Hansen, MUNCH’s director, says: ‘With You Are What You Is, Kiyoshi Yamamoto pushes the limits of how we experience art – not as something distant and unapproachable, but as a living, participatory process. The exhibition opens up a space of wonder and community, in which our visitors can feel, explore and move around together with the art. This is in line with our goal of making art an inclusive experience for everyone.’
From Brazilian traditions to the Oslo Fjord
Yamamoto takes inspiration from their Japanese-Brazilian background and combines this artistic heritage with one foot in their locality. The exhibition’s colour palette is based on Edvard Munch’s iconic collection of texts, sketches and graphic motifs, The Tree of Knowledge, and the pigments are diluted with water taken from the Oslo fjord directly outside the museum. In the entrance, visitors will find themselves in a corridor with ribbons inspired by Brazil’s ‘Fitas do Bonfim’, a symbol of faith, luck, and protection. Short messages are printed on the ribbons, in the manner of prayers or wishes. These are little gifts given to the viewer – both for those who are invited to take one, and to those who actually do so.
Kiyoshi Yamamoto says: ‘When I began this project, I needed to look back on my childhood. In this way, it has also become a work that can be read as a biography. Through this project, the visitor will get to know me better. But who am I? I like to define myself as a professional immigrant, a person of ‘colour’ and someone who is always in motion, moving through spaces, places, gender and colour. I am the very definition of fluidity and multiculturalism. I was born over there, grew up here, and will die somewhere else. I am one hundred per cent nothing. I am you and them.’
Children as Art Lovers
You Are What You Is is the fourth exhibition in our Come Think With Us series, in which MUNCH explores the role of children as viewers of contemporary art. Yamamoto’s exhibition will give visitors of all ages the freedom to enjoy however they want, and breaks down the usual divide between artwork and viewer. In this playful exhibition, the artist allows us to reconsider who we are and celebrate bending the rules.
‘I think of myself as a person of mixed ethnicity,’ says Yamamoto. ‘I was born into a family from two continents. I’m not white enough or black enough, not masculine enough or feminine enough – and so it goes on. This project is situated between many different layers.
A Living Exhibition Space
As well as the large textile works, the video work and the ribbons, Yamamoto has collaborated with architect Ingrid Aspen to design an organic, mountain-shaped piece of furniture for sitting or lying on. It’s intended to give the audience different perspectives on the work and provides new ways of experiencing the art.
The exhibition even continues outside the gallery space, with a large textile work visible from ground level, as well as an experimental audio guide which leads the audience from the lobby all the way up to the exhibition. Via a pop-up workshop, performance and an extensive events programme, children, young people and adults are invited to actively be a part of Yamamoto’s artistic universe.
Events and Merchandise
4 April: Pre-opening, Late Night at MUNCH – a party night dedicated to Yamamoto’s universe.
5 April: Official public opening.
6 April: Artist talk with Kiyoshi Yamamoto and curator Tove Sørvåg.
Whole exhibition period: Workshops and performances.
MUNCH Ung programme with creative activities for young art enthusiasts.
In addition, the museum shop will be launching an exclusive merchandise collection inspired by the exhibition. The range includes ribbons from the exhibition, wristbands for both adults and children, furoshiki, silk scarves, keyrings and a bag modelled after the MUNCH building. Products are designed by both Kiyoshi Yamamoto and MUNCH, with the aim of extending and expanding the audience’s exhibition experience.
