Introducing 2021 Visual AIDS Curatorial Resident Sho Akita

More recently, you might have seen his solo video installation Lovers at the Museum of Modern Art in 2016. MoMA and Kyoto City University of Arts both undertook major conservation projects to restore the installation. When I heard of the simultaneous restoration happening both in New York and Kyoto, I tried to imagine Teiji’s life in those two cities. But his archives are mostly about his work and life in Kyoto and very little is known about his time outside of the country. Reading the wonderful book memorandum, which is a compilation of his writings and interviews edited by Dumb Type, it is clear to me that New York City and the U.S. was such an inspiration for him. He met artists and performers in the East Village scene, received a fellowship from the Asian Cultural Council, and traveled throughout the States. He even had a boyfriend in San Francisco. While living in New York, he also learned that he was HIV positive. He didn’t tell anyone about it in Japan until 1992. Even today in Japan there are very few visible figures who are out about their HIV status.

Teiji was no stranger to Visual AIDS. In 1994, he helped bring Electric Blanket, a major public projection project originally organized for Day Without Art 1990, to Yokohama during the International AIDS Conference. Artists Allen Frame and Frank Franca, as well as scholar Douglas Crimp, travelled to Yokohama for the conference, exchanging information and strategies with AIDS activists in Japan.

After coming out about his HIV status, Teiji asked other Dumb Type members to let him lead the next project, which would be named S/N. With sound, dance, video, and performances, S/N explicitly addresses AIDS, identity, gender, sexuality, and border politics. Its political message still resonates strongly, unfortunately, today. As part of my residency, Visual AIDS will stream S/N online, making it widely accessible for the first time. Though Teiji hoped to perform S/N in New York, and it was welcomed by more than 20 cities around the world, only one organization was willing to present the work in the states, in Seattle in 1994.

In Japan, Teiji’s friends continue to perform and make incredible artwork. They have been very generous and supportive of this project, and I hold the memories and images they have shared with me dearly. My residency will culminate with a panel discussion with some of these friends, as well as Teiji's collaborators in New York

As time passes and people’s memories fade, my curiosity about Teiji’s life in New York has felt more urgent, and I hope these programs lead me to more stories of him in New York. With the tremendous assistance of Visual AIDS, I will meet with Teiji’s friends, collaborators, and acquaintances in New York, and also visit sites in the city that were important to his life. I hope to find out more about Teiji’s experiences in New York, both his joys and struggles. I hope it gives new meaning and light to our understanding of him and his work, but also to artists, LGBTQ people and those who live with HIV and AIDS in Japan today.

Visual AIDS’ International Curatorial Residency, developed in partnership with Residency Unlimited, encourages the development of exhibitions, programs, and scholarship about HIV and contemporary art by inviting a curator, art historian, or arts writer from outside of the United States to research in New York.

Programming for Sho Akita's residency is supported in part by a grant from the Japan Foundation, New York. Visual AIDS thanks Dumb Type and Normal Screen for their support of these programs.