Switzerland's Culturescapes Festival selects Tokyo as focus for 2014

Culturescapes Tokyo 2014: Embedded in the festive events for the 150th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Switzerland and Japan CULTURESCAPES has set the focus on Tokyo with the 12th edition of the festival in 2014.

Every year, CULTURESCAPES Festival in Basel chooses a different country or city as the focus, aiming to contribute to international understanding between the different cultures. The 2013 Culturescapes (October 19 - December 13) focuses on the Balkans.

The Moscow festival of 2012 when CULTURESCAPES provided a ‘matrix' of a city and its environs turned up some exciting discoveries, opening up new lines of inquiry into the city as a crucible of change, as a centre for avant-garde art and as the scene of a dynamic urban life that is more multicultural than any one country could ever be.

CULTURESCAPES 2014 is therefore to embark on another such experiment when it showcases the many different forms of artistic expression, the many different takes on history and the many traumas of the Japanese capital of Tokyo. We would like to introduce the cultural topography of a Japanese metropolis and put the questions that moves the society there now, in a context for the discourse in Switzerland.

While the roots of Japanese culture - Bunraku, Ikebana, the tea ceremony and Noh theatre - cannot be disregarded, the focus of the festival, as always, will be on contemporary art production. The Japanese Embassy in Switzerland is to support this venture.