YAMASHIRO Chikako

Born 1976 in Okinawa
Based in Okinawa

Yamashiro Chikako employs video, photography, and combinations thereof in exploring themes related to her native Okinawa. Her first solo exhibition, Woman at Graveyard (2002) was held at Maejima Art Center (Okinawa). Yamashiro’s work frequently features sites unique to Japan’s southernmost prefecture, such as its distinctive cemeteries, the perimeter fences of US military bases, and the sea around Henoko (the site of a planned base relocation), and in her early pieces she herself often appears. Through this creative process Yamashiro grapples physically and emotionally with Okinawa as a place while dealing in metaphorical terms with its traditional culture, history, and convoluted circumstances. The simultaneously fictional and documentary character of her narratives, and the compelling intensity of her poetic tableaux, invites wide-ranging interpretations that expand beyond the borders of Okinawa.