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Fumio NANJO
Fumio NANJO (b.1949) is currently the Deputy Director of the Mori Art Museum, Tokyo. He is also an art critic and a lecturer at Keio University, Tokyo.
Main achievements include: commissioner of the Japan Pavilion at the Venice Biennale (1997); commissioner of the Taipei Biennale (1998); member of the jury committee of the Turner Prize by the Tate Gallery (1998); co-curator of the 3rd Asia-Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art (1999); member of the selection committee of the Sydney Biennale (2000); director for the Japan Pavilion at EXPO 2000 in Hanover; artistic co-director of the Yokohama Triennale (2001); a selector of Artes Mundi Prize in Wales, UK in 2004. Also served as an artistic director on several public art and corporate art projects including Shinjuku I-LAND" Public Art Projects (Tokyo/1995), Hakata Riverain Art Project (Fukuoka/1999), Art Project for Obayashi Corporation Head Office (Tokyo/1999).
Artistic Director's Statement
The world today is complex and diverse, fraught with war and terrorism. As Huntington suggested in his book, The Clash of Civilisations, is it really impossible for people with different values and faiths to live together peacefully? In this age of ever diversifying and mixed value systems what should people believe in and live by? To live moment by moment is also to make choices from multiple possibilities. What do we base these decisions to live by on? Some people believe in the absolute truth of religion, others believe in the rules of capitalism and economics, others in progress and development, and yet others believe in the values of nature and the environment. Love and Art can also become ways or pointers by which to live.
Although Singapore is a small island nation, different faiths, languages and ethnic groups coexist without violent conflict. It is perhaps fitting then to reflect on the meaning of belief today in such a society. Through art, can we once again think about what binds us together as human beings? This seemingly straightforward yet potentially complex question underpins the first edition of the Singapore Biennale.
Fumio Nanjo
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