2015
Single Channel
The “Keiko Kan” Folk Heritage Museum of Aomori City collected, stored and exhibited around 15,000 historical documents and materials related to archaeology, folklore, tools and art, as well as the Aomori air raids and the post-war construction, but closed in 2006. Its director was Tanaka Chuzaburo, a researcher in the field who was born in Kawauchi Town, Shimokita County (now Mutsu City) in Aomori, and was dedicated to the research and collection of folk tools. This work brings light on how the state of Japan has been constructed, through telling of the lives of the people of the Tohoku region, which are not recorded within official histories. It is complemented by 8mm films made by local people during the period of post-war turmoil to Japan’s rapid economic growth, gathered following a public call to show the memory of a period missing from the collection. By compiling folk materials so common in rural areas that they are not often regarded as cultural heritage, and editing them anew in light of the current state initiative to revitalise rural areas, this work critically constructs the unequal relationship between the rural areas and the central government and institutions, which still pulses through the present.