Shin Hanagata "Mitai: Retroactive Media Theory— Human Torsion"

Marshall McLuhan famously argued that all media are extensions of the human body and its senses. Shin Hanagata's work suggests the reverse: media do not simply extend the body but infiltrate and reshape it. Through moving image, performance and installation, Hanagata explores how technology transforms the body, as though human inventions were flowing back into their creators. Born in Tokyo in 1995, Hanagata is an emerging artist whose recent projects have received international recognition, including an Award of Distinction at Prix Ars Electronica 2026. A recurring concept in the artist's practice is torsion, a term referring to twisting. Hanagata uses it as an analogy for imagining bodies that exceed fixed functions and human-centered ways of thinking. This exhibition marks Hanagata's first major solo gallery exhibition. Centered on the idea of the "holes" of the human body, it presents a series of moving image works exploring unfamiliar forms that exist within every body yet often go unnoticed. The exhibition title, Mitai, is a coined term that evokes ideas of the unknown, the incomplete and the future, suggesting that the possibilities for imagining bodily transformation remain open.