The signpost

Teppei Higuchi | Conzert, performance, exhibition

Rika Ono (1989- ) is a Japanese artist who used to be my classmate in Tokyo. She visited Hallstatt in May 2019, and went missing during her journey. Through my research I found some objects in Hallstatt – such as a notebook, clothes, or bills – which I concluded to be her belongings. This project is a “searching for the missing person”, with some clews left in the area.
In her notebook, Rika Ono re-wrote a map of Hallstatt with imaginary letters she invented, and created a theatre in the Land of Schwara-Schwadi for puppets (which she found in souvenir shops in Hallstatt), jazz musicians, car horns and boat signals. Excerpts from the theatre Schwara-Schwadi – which I discovered in her notebook – had been performed in the “Werkschau”, besides my lecture on her works and “traces” (i.e., her disappearance) . An exhibition space was open for her lost (found) items at the castle grub and art shool HTBLA Hallstatt.

(c) FS1 Salzburg