The TURN + BIENALSUR 2025 project, inspired by the inaudible dimension of sound, closes with an exhibition of ceramic pieces.
Since its first edition in 2017, BIENALSUR, the transnational contemporary art biennial incubated at the National University of Tres de Febrero (UNTREF) and organised in conjunction with the Fundación Foro del Sur, has promoted various initiatives alongside TURN, a project of the Tokyo University of the Arts designed by artist and academic Katsuhiko Hibino. This collaboration has taken different forms in each edition, but its initiatives always maintain the same spirit: cultural encounters focused on specific actions, determined by the needs and practices of Japan and Argentina.
In 2025, the TURN + BIENALSUR project will conclude its exchange with the opening, on 3 December, of Cuenco vibrante, an exhibition of ceramics created by artist Asuka Shikiba (JPN) in Buenos Aires. The work is inspired by the vibratory dimension of sound and the experience of workshops with communities of deaf and hard-of-hearing people.
Along the same lines, during his residency in Japan in August, sound artist Juan Sorrentino (ARG) linked his work to the visual, tactile and inaudible experience of sound. In residence in Buenos Aires during November, ceramicist Shikiba worked on a series of concave pieces capable of generating various resonances and vibrations. During her process, she collaborated with hearing-impaired people from the NGO Casacucia and deaf women from Casa Hogar.
The pieces revolve around the idea of Utsuwa, a Japanese word that refers to all kinds of containers and bowls, but also alludes to the human body's capacity to receive. Emptiness, a physical condition necessary for reception and vibration, thus becomes the vehicle for a particular type of communication.
The opening of the closing exhibition of the TURN + BIENALSUR 2025 project will take place at the MUNTREF Centre for Art and Science, at the Caseros I Headquarters, on Wednesday, 3 December—the date on which International Day of Persons with Disabilities is commemorated—at 4 p.m.
