Aichi Triennale 2025: A Time Between Ashes and Roses, Period:September 13 to November 30, 2025, 79 days, Venues: Aichi Arts Center, Aichi Prefectural Ceramic Museum, Seto City

What’s On

AKN PROJECT

  • Performing Arts
  • Aichi Arts Center

Performances

New DirectionTheater
Human Pavilion - A Comedy
  • Illustration: Kogani Oshiro
“What are they discriminated against?” A landmark play of Okinawa, newly directed by a new generation of creators.

First performed in 1976, the play Human Pavilion is the most important work by the dramatist Chinen Seishin, a piece that won the Kishida Kunio Drama Award, and remains influential in Okinawa to the current day. Based on the Human Pavilion incident of 1903, this monumental work is a poignant satire of Okinawan history, incorporating issues such as the assimilationist education conducted in colonies under Japanese imperial rule, the Battle of Okinawa, the U.S. military government of Okinawa, and Okinawa’s “return” to Japan. This play is the third recreation of Chinen’s play by AKN PROJECT, a group formed in 2020 by his daughter, Chinen Akane. Coproduced by the up-and-coming Okinawan artist Aragaki Nana, scenographer Sasaki Ayami, and the dramaturg Hayashi Tatsuki, the show has been restructured as a “comedy” rich in irony that is relatable to a modern-day audience. It aims to reverse the relationship between strength and weakness, indifference and suffering, being on the inside and being on the outside of the gate, and being at the center of the nation and being at its margins.

Date
  • MEET THE ARTIST
  • Childcare Service
  • Japanese closed captions
  • Relaxed Performance
  • Childcare Service
  • Japanese closed captions
  • MEET THE ARTIST
  • Childcare Service
  • Japanese closed captions
  • Childcare Service
  • Japanese closed captions
Venue

Aichi Prefectural Art Theater, Mini Theater (B1F)
(1-13-2 Higashisakura, Higashi-ku, Nagoya)

Performance time

110 min.

Language

Okinawan and Okinawan Japanese with English subtitles

Tickets
Adult
¥3,500
U25
¥2,000

* Same-day tickets (General and U25) are ¥500 more than the advance price.
* Pair tickets (6,500 Yen) are sold only in advance.

Ticket Purchase

Seating

Unreserved

Staff
Playwright:
Chinen Seishin
Direction:
Chinen Akane, Arakaki Nana
Dramaturge:
Hayashi Tatsuki
Set Design:
Sasaki Ayami
Costume Design:
Fujitani Kyoko
Cast:
Inoue Asuka, Kamida Sei, Nakamine Yusaku
Performance flyer

It will be released at a later date.

Assistance for viewing
[Before you attend]
  • This work is performed in Okinawan and Okinawan Japanese.
  • Children of preschool age are not permitted to attend the performance. Visitors with preschool-aged children are encouraged to use the childcare service.
  • Visitors using wheelchairs are asked to contact i-Ticket at 0570-00-5310.
[Childcare Services]
Childcare services are available. Advance reservation is required. Further details will be announced on the official website at a later date.
[MEET THE ARTIST (, )]
A talk with the cast and director(s) will follow the performance. Audience members are welcome to attend without a reservation.
  • Japanese-English consecutive interpretation is available.
  • Live text support via UD Talk.
[Relaxed Performance ()]
Relaxed performances offer a more flexible setting and looser audience etiquette. Attendees are welcome to make noise, come and go as they please, and enjoy the show at their own pace. These performances offer a welcoming space for parents with young children, visitors with disabilities, and anyone who finds traditional theater environments challenging.
[Performance with Japanese closed captions (all performances)]
Japanese closed captions are available for deaf and hard of hearing visitors. Advance registration is required. Further details will be announced on the official website at a later date.

Profile

  • Formed 2020 in Okinawa, Japan. Based in Okinawa, Japan.

In 1978, Chinen Seishin (1941-2013) became the first Okinawa-born playwright to win the Kishida Prize for Drama for his work Human Pavilion. To carry on the spirit of the original work, Akane Chinen, daughter of the playwright, launched the AKN Project in 2020. In 2025, the 80th year since the end of World War II, the project will newly stage Human Pavilion specifically as a comedy, with an approach adapted to the present day.
First performed in 1976, Human Pavilion is a milestone play that bitterly satirizes the history of Okinawa, beginning with the Human Pavilion Incident and interweaving Japanization education, the Battle of Okinawa, rule by the US military, and “reversion” to Japan. AKN Project is now taking up this work because its members believe that its possibilities have not yet been exhausted and it still has much to say to the current generation. Recalling the role-playing games and sudden reversals that Seishin loved, the group added, “If theater has power, it is when it shows the possibility that our little role-playing can induce a sudden turnabout in the relationship between strength and weakness, apathy and pain, the inside and outside of the gate, and the center and fringes of a nation.”
Chinen Akane is taking up the challenge of the second re-creation of this work together with the Naha Cultural Arts Theater NAHArt. The performance will have the participation of Hayashi Tatsuki from NAHart as dramaturge, Arakaki Nana as a collaborating director, and Sasaki Ayami as scenographer. For this re-creation, Chinen is endeavoring to daringly present Human Pavilion as a comedy.

Selected performances
2022
“Human Pavillion – A Comedy,” Naha Cultural Arts Theater NAHArt (Okinawa, Japan)
2021
“Human Pavillion – A Comedy,” Online Streaming