The mystery of the spinning crocodiles

Fifteen years of The National Art Center, Tokyo: the museum celebrates the anniversary with a solo show by contemporary artist Tamura Satoru (b. 1972) starting June 15. The focus is on his colorful sculptures, the Spinning Crocodiles, which give the exhibition its name. The National Art Center, Tokyo arranges them into a large-scale installation with a 12-meter-long crocodile at its center. Tamura Satoru's humorous work shakes up the established values of the art industry and ponders the question, »What is art?« It's worth a visit for adults and children as well, as the event is a testament to the artist's extremely free and sometimes infantile imagination.

Tamura Satoru has an anecdote to share about his Spinning Crocodiles: he tells how he was supposed to implement a project involving electricity in his third year at university. He had no idea of the subject matter and went to bed the day before handing it in with the idea of implementing whatever popped into his head the next morning. Then, for some reason, spinning crocodiles appeared in front of his inner eye.  

Soon after, the prototype for the Spinning Crocodiles was created: a four-and-a-half-meter-long crocodile that spun at 30 rotations per minute (1994). A key moment for Tamura Satoru: he discovered his own creative power that preceded the idea. For several years, he then carried out works according to this sample. In the process, he said, he always wondered why the crocodiles were actually spinning, until he realized that it wasn't the spinning crocodiles themselves that were essential to the meaning, but the fact that they were doing it, even though he didn't know why - so he advises the audience, »Don't ask why crocodiles spin.« The National Art
Center, Tokyo is showing Spinning Crocodiles through July 18.