Painting and installation by Junko Wada
23 / 08 / 24 to 20 / 10 / 24
With dance performance Eos by Junko Wada
Music by Hans Peter Kuhn
It all started when I picked up the book ‘The Burning Green Tree – Vacillation’ by Kenzaburo Oe from my bookshelf in February last year. It is about events in his home forest. No sooner had I started reading it than I received the news that Oe had passed away and it seemed to me that his soul had travelled around the world before his death and influenced me, among others, to finally read his book.
In all his books, he refers to Dante’s ‘The Divine Comedy’ and I felt compelled to read this famous book as well. I realised that the book was difficult to read without knowledge of Greek and Roman mythology, so I had to re-read the books I had on the mythologies. I was fascinated by the unique characters and stories of the gods and heroes and have spent a lot of time in the ancient world of Europe over the past year.
When I visited the space for the exhibition at Zagreus in February this year, I came up with the idea of small-scale works going across the walls in the form of a frieze. It was a natural development, arising from the architectural conditions, but at the same time I was inspired by the study of ancient mythologies to deal with portraits and stories of Greek and Roman gods and heroes and to make them the subject of the paintings.
After I had completed many of these small works, I chose one of the gods for the last wall and painted him in large format. I was surprised that the god I chose, Dionysus, was the same god as Zagreus.
Zagreus means ‘the subterranean hunter’ and in his origin myth he is dismembered, cooked and eaten by the Titans. Afterwards he is in the underworld and is then reborn as Dionysus.
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We serve the menu
GODDESS DISHES
A menu combining Japanese and Greek dishes
Unagi Bento
Braised eel in soy sauce, sake, mirin and sesame seeds
Kritaraki with fermented tomato, parmesan and egg
Vegetarian: braised eggplant with soy sauce, sake and mirin instead of eel
2017 Rkatsiteli Qvevri Corporation Kindzmarauli, Georgia
Tempura and tzatziki
Tempura with vegetables, sesame leaves and shrimp,
Yoghurt with cucumber and garlic, wasabi cream with orange and lime
2018 Hugel family, Pinot Blanc Classic, Alsace
Prometheus + Dionysus
Poached saddle of beef in red wine and spices, kombu with jelly,
Sushi rice with vine leaves, braised onion in honey
Vegetarian: beet in red wine and spices instead of meat
2020 Domaine Arsac Messis Ultima, Ardèche
Mastic parfait, grapes with olive oil and sea salt, quince bread
2021 Mandelbaum Riesling Auslese, Steitz winery, Nahe