Takuya Watanabe

Japanese visual artist whose practice centers on video installation. His work explores themes of migration, labor, and the complex entanglements between people and their environments. Drawing from close engagement with local communities and in-depth research into social conditions, Watanabe examines personal narratives, embodied experiences, and the hidden structures embedded in landscapes. Through this approach, he reveals the interplay between power and vulnerability.
Watanabe’s research-driven practice is shaped by his participation in several
international residency programs. These include the Delfina Foundation (London, 2024), SAM Residencies (Singapore, 2023), WIELS Residency Programme (Brussels, 2022), and ARCUS Project 2019 IBARAKI Artist-in-Residence Program (Ibaraki, Japan).
Recent exhibitions include CRITERIUM 101: Takuya Watanabe (Contemporary Art Center, Art Tower Mito, Ibaraki, 2024) and As Above, So Below, TOKAS Creator-in-Residence Exhibition (TOKAS Hongo, Tokyo, 2023).
He has been selected for the 2025–2027 overseas study program for emerging artists, supported by the Agency for Cultural Affairs of Japan, and will be based in London for two years.

PROJECT FOR MiSHŌ
The aim of this project is to bring to light the political dimension inherent in the concept of “nature.” While nature is often spoken of as if it were neutral and universal, its meaning and value have in fact been shaped within historical and cultural contexts, and have frequently been mobilized for political purposes.
Even in recent years in Japan, terms such as “organic” and “environmental conservation,” which carry open and ecological connotations, have been tied to nationalist rhetoric. The call to “protect nature” can obscure the question of what exactly is being protected and what is being excluded, while at the same time legitimizing a particular value system. A striking example can be found in the conservation policies of the Nazi regime. In 1930s Germany, under the ideology of “Blood and Soil (Blut und Boden),” landscape preservation and organic farming were promoted. Yet in practice, these policies were bound up with the ideology of ethnic purification and national defense. This shows how the concept of “nature” can masquerade as goodwill or universality while being transformed into a logic of exclusion, revealing the danger that environmental and ecological discourse can become instruments of exclusionary order.
To examine these conceptual issues at a more practical level, this project takes as its field site the satoyama landscape of Fujino and the practices of permaculture carried out there. Fujino, though located on the urban periphery, is a region where diverse ecosystems coexist with self-sufficient communities, while also being a site of constant human management and decision-making. It is also home to the Permaculture Center Japan (PCJ), regarded as the hub of the permaculture movement in Japan.
The project will consider how practitioners’ decisions and experiences are shaped by the interplay of legal systems, economic demands, communal norms, and personal beliefs. Put differently, it will explore how bodily and material practices exist inseparably alongside abstract and unseen conceptual conditions. Moreover, beyond human action alone, it will look at the level of “landscape,” taking into account how relationships with nonhuman beings shape these very conditions.
The research will mainly involve interviews and field observations and, where possible, filming and collaborative activities. By situating itself within this site of practice, the project seeks to render visible the layered and multifaceted images of “nature” that emerge in the encounters between humans and the natural world.