Rei Hayama

Rei Hayama is a Japanese artist who works mainly with moving images. After many thoughtful and practical experiences amongst wildlife in the unique environment of her youth, she studied at the Department of Moving Images and Performing Arts, Tama Art University and has been making films since 2008. Hayama’s films revolve around nature and all other living things that have been lost or neglected from an anthropocentric point of view. Through film and video works with sound, poetic writings and symbolic imageries, Hayama gently seeks the harmonious connection between nature and human beings, bringing forward the invisible layers of our natural reality into the human imagination. The philosophy of Hayama’s work is deeply engaged with cinema and interprets the cinema space as an artificial nature. She describes her work as “A Humble Cinema” and explores multiple dreams after the dream of humans.

an emu in an enclosure looks at the camera

On the collinear and reflected on the water,​ 2018
Video (H.264, 1440×1080, 24fps, 50Mbps), 4:00 min
Courtesy of the artist and Empty Gallery, Hong Kong

Curator

Freya Chou

Freya Chou is a curator and editor based in Hong Kong and Taipei. She was a curator of Para Site, Hong Kong from 2015 to 2019. Prior to that, she was Co-curator of the 10th Shanghai Biennial (with Anselm Franke, Cosmin Costinas, and Liu Xiao, 2014), Assistant Curator of the 7th Taipei Biennial (co-curated by Hongjohn Lin and Tirdad Zolghadr, 2010), and Curatorial Assistant of the 6th Taipei Biennial (co-curated by Manray Hsu and Vasif Kortun, 2008). She has edited and contributed writing to many artist books, magazines, and catalogues.

Artists