SHINGO YOSHIDA

Frac Sud - Cité de l’art contemporain

 

7 Feb - 15 Nov 2026

Artists

Keita Mori, Yoko Ono, Lieko Shiga, Mieko Shiomi, Atsuko Tanaka, Hideki Umezawa,

Chikako Yamashiro, Shingo Yoshida, Gōzō Yoshimasu, Hiroshi Yoshimura

Curated by Élodie Royer

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In partnership with Japan Foundation and La Maison de la culture du Japon in Paris

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« The Ecology of Relationships – The Forest is the Sea’s Lover » is a unique dialogue between pieces by Japanese artists of different generations. The exhibition explores the emotional, ecological and his-torical bonds that connect us to our habitats, set against our modern lifestyles and the ensuing envi-ronmental disasters which have made these invisible connections both invaluable and unstable.

 

Based on the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear accident that hit North East Japan on March 11th 2011, an event that destroyed people’s lives, society and the environment, the exhibition displays pieces crafted post-Fukushima alongside artwork seeped in the history and rapid modernisation of 1970s Japan. The design echoes the FRAC’s architecture by Kengo Kuma and the exhibition demonstrates how the events of March 11th and the pieces they inspired bear the hallmarks of late 20th century Japanese art.

The exhibition artists take a deep dive into ecosystems that come together and come undone. They share a love for adventurous artwork which celebrates both collaboration and conflict, and they re-fuse to ignore the importance of these bonds that connect us to the world around us. In other words, these artists cling to an ecology of relationships based on the exhibition’s name: The Forest is the Sea’s Lover, taken from an environmental tale by Shigeatsu Hatakeyama.

 

This exhibition is a continuation of the first part of an exhibition organized at La Maison de la culture du Japon from April 30 to July 26, 2025 in Paris, “L’Écologie des choses” linking the practices of Japanese artists of different generations in the light of ecological issues, curated by Muriel Enjalran, Alexandre Quoi and Élodie Royer. In partnership with the Frac Sud and with the support of the Musée d’art moderne et contemporain de Saint-Étienne Métropole (MAMC+).