Toshio Iwai
Encyclopedia
is a Japanese interactive media
Interactive media
Interactive media normally refers to products and services on digital computer-based systems which respond to the user’s actions by presenting content such as text, graphics, animation, video, audio, etc.-Terminology:...
and installation
Installation art
Installation art describes an artistic genre of three-dimensional works that are often site-specific and designed to transform the perception of a space. Generally, the term is applied to interior spaces, whereas exterior interventions are often called Land art; however, the boundaries between...
artist who has also created a number of commercial video games. In addition he has worked in television, music performance, museum design and digital musical instrument design.
Education and early work
Iwai was born in Kira, AichiKira, Aichi
is a former town located in Hazu District, Aichi Prefecture, Japan. As of May 1, 2004, the village had an estimated population of 22,280 and a population density of 619.2 persons per km². Its total area was 35.98 km²....
, Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
. As a child, he spent time creating flip book
Flip book
A flip book or flick book is a book with a series of pictures that vary gradually from one page to the next, so that when the pages are turned rapidly, the pictures appear to animate by simulating motion or some other change. Flip books are often illustrated books for children, but may also be...
-style animations in the corner of text books and making motor-driven mechanical toys, since these were the only technologies available to him. In 1981 Iwai matriculated in the Fine Arts Department at the University of Tsukuba
University of Tsukuba
is located in the city of Tsukuba, Ibaraki Prefecture in the Kantō region of Japan. The University has 28 college clusters and schools with a total of around 15,000 students...
, studying Plastic Art and Mixed Media. Influenced by the work of Norman McLaren
Norman McLaren
Norman McLaren, CC, CQ was a Scottish-born Canadian animator and film director known for his work for the National Film Board of Canada...
, he began producing installation art
Installation art
Installation art describes an artistic genre of three-dimensional works that are often site-specific and designed to transform the perception of a space. Generally, the term is applied to interior spaces, whereas exterior interventions are often called Land art; however, the boundaries between...
that combined pre-cinema animation
Animation
Animation is the rapid display of a sequence of images of 2-D or 3-D artwork or model positions in order to create an illusion of movement. The effect is an optical illusion of motion due to the phenomenon of persistence of vision, and can be created and demonstrated in several ways...
techniques (the phenakistoscope
Phenakistoscope
The phenakistoscope was an early animation device that used the persistence of vision principle to create an illusion of motion.-History:...
and the zoetrope
Zoetrope
A zoetrope is a device that produces an illusion of action from a rapid succession of static pictures. The term zoetrope is from the Greek words "ζωή – zoe", "life" and τρόπος – tropos, "turn". It may be taken to mean "wheel of life"....
) with modern methods of image capture and creation (photocopiers, video cameras and computer graphics
Computer graphics
Computer graphics are graphics created using computers and, more generally, the representation and manipulation of image data by a computer with help from specialized software and hardware....
) and of stroboscopic
Stroboscopic
Stroboscopic may refer to:* Stroboscopic effect, visual temporal aliasing* Stroboscope, any of various stroboscopic devices* Strobe light, high-intensity and short-duration stroboscopic device...
lighting (video monitors, video projectors and LEDs
LEDS
LEDS can be initials for:* Law Enforcement Data System* Link Eleven Display System* Low Energy Dislocation Structure* Land Electronic Defence System * LEDs * Life-Events and Difficulties Schedule...
). His 1985 installation Time Stratum won the Gold prize at the High Technology Art Exhibition '85, held in Shibuya Seibu, Tokyo. Time Stratum II was awarded the Grand Prize at the 17th Contemporary Japanese Art Exhibition, Meguro Art Museum, Tokyo. In 1987 Iwai graduated from the University of Tsukuba with a Master's degree in Plastic Art and Mixed Media. In the same year, Iwai designed his first published videogame, Otocky
Otocky
Otocky is a videogame released in 1987 for the Family Computer Disk System in Japan. Developed by SEDIC and published by ASCII Corporation, the game was conceived and designed by Toshio Iwai.-Gameplay:...
, in association with ASCII Corporation.
In 1991-92 Iwai was an Artist-in-Residence at the Exploratorium
Exploratorium
The Exploratorium is a museum in San Francisco with over 475 participatory exhibits, all of them made onsite, that mix science and art. It also aims to promote museums as informal education centers....
in San Francisco, California, where he created two exhibits that are now part of the museum's permanent collection, Well of Lights (1992) and Music Insects (1992). Music Insects became the foundation for his unpublished video game Sound Fantasy
Sound Fantasy
Sound Fantasy also titled Sound Factory during production, is an unreleased video game for the Super NES/Super Famicom.-Summary:Interactive media artist Toshio Iwai designed the game in the early 1990s using concepts from the installation art piece Music Insects, which he created during his time as...
.
This period of work culminated in Another Time, Another Space (1993), an interactive installation devised for Antwerp Centraal Station, Belgium. The installation used 15 video cameras to capture live images of visitors to the station; 30 computers manipulated the video feeds output to 30 video monitors in real-time, introducing visual effects such as time-lapse delays, slow-motion effects and time compression.
Later installation work
From 1994-1995 Iwai was an Artist-in-Residence at the ZKM (Center for Art and Media) in KarlsruheKarlsruhe
The City of Karlsruhe is a city in the southwest of Germany, in the state of Baden-Württemberg, located near the French-German border.Karlsruhe was founded in 1715 as Karlsruhe Palace, when Germany was a series of principalities and city states...
, Germany. Around this time his work became increasingly focused on the relationship between sound and image, using interactivity
Interactivity
In the fields of information science, communication, and industrial design, there is debate over the meaning of interactivity. In the "contingency view" of interactivity, there are three levels:...
, gestural interface and generative
Generative music
Generative music is a term popularized by Brian Eno to describe music that is ever-different and changing, and that is created by a system.- Theory :There are four primary perspectives on "Generative Music" Generative music is a term popularized by Brian Eno to describe music that is ever-different...
, interactive and aleatoric music
Aleatoric music
Aleatoric music is music in which some element of the composition is left to chance, and/or some primary element of a composed work's realization is left to the determination of its performer...
. These interests are expressed in three key installation works, Resonance of 4, Piano - As Image Media and Composition on the Table.
Resonance of 4 (1994) is a collaborative music-creation artwork consisting of four adjacent stations, each comprising a small podium bearing a computer mouse, a 16-by-16 grid projected onto the floor from a video projector above, and a cursor connected to the mouse. Dots can be placed in each of the grid's cells by clicking with the mouse. A synchronized bar sweeps across all the grids simultaneously, triggering musical notes wherever a dot has been placed. Sound is relayed over a loudspeaker system, and the notes from all four stations are superimposed, although each station has its own musical tone. This work was shown at the Serious Games exhibition at the Laing Art Gallery
Laing Art Gallery
The Laing Art Gallery in Newcastle upon Tyne, England is located on New Bridge Street. It was opened in 1904 and is now managed by Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums and sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. In front of the gallery is the Blue Carpet.The gallery holds oil paintings,...
, Newcastle in 1996 and 1997 and at the Barbican Arts Centre, London in 1997.
In Piano - As Image Media (1995), audience members operate a trackball to draw lighted dots on a grid projected onto a sheet of fabric that leads to the keyboard of a small grand piano. The dots move towards the piano keyboard, and as they come close to it they accelerate and strike a key. The piano, controlled by a computer, plays the note corresponding to the 'struck' key, and at the same time a computer-generated graphical figure appears on another sheet of fabric suspended above the piano, appearing to fly out of the piano and up into the air. This work, along with Composition on the Table, was shown in the Play Zone at the Millennium Dome
Millennium Dome
The Millennium Dome, colloquially referred to simply as The Dome or even The O2 Arena, is the original name of a large dome-shaped building, originally used to house the Millennium Experience, a major exhibition celebrating the beginning of the third millennium...
in London, 1999-2000. It was also one of the works used in Iwai's performance collaboration with Ryuichi Sakamoto, Music Plays Images x Images Play Music.
Composition on the Table (1998/99) comprises four white tables bearing physical interface components: switches, dials, and turntables. Computer graphics images are projected onto the tables from ceiling-mounted video projectors, and loudspeakers are present. As the audience manipulates the interface elements, graphical and audio changes take place in a way that is intimately connected to the audience's input. The objective of this work was to create a mixed reality
Mixed reality
Mixed reality refers to the merging of real and virtual worlds to produce new environments and visualisations where physical and digital objects co-exist and interact in real time...
environment where multiple participants could create visuals and music together. Elements of this work are recognizable in Iwai's Nintendo DS
Nintendo DS
The is a portable game console produced by Nintendo, first released on November 21, 2004. A distinctive feature of the system is the presence of two separate LCD screens, the lower of which is a touchscreen, encompassed within a clamshell design, similar to the Game Boy Advance SP...
videogame Electroplankton
Electroplankton
Electroplankton is an interactive music video game developed by Toshio Iwai and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo DS handheld video game console. It was first released in Japan, and was later released in North America and Europe. This game allows the player to interact with animated plankton...
. The piece was presented as part of the Art Gallery at SIGGRAPH
SIGGRAPH
SIGGRAPH is the name of the annual conference on computer graphics convened by the ACM SIGGRAPH organization. The first SIGGRAPH conference was in 1974. The conference is attended by tens of thousands of computer professionals...
'99, Los Angeles.
From 1996 to 1998 Iwai was the first Artist in Residence at IAMAS in Ōgaki
Ogaki, Gifu
is a city located in Gifu Prefecture, Japan. It was incorporated as a city on April 1, 1918. As of July 2011, the city has an estimated population of 160,999 and a total area of .Ōgaki was the final destination for the haiku poet Matsuo Bashō...
, Japan. In 1997 he had a major retrospective exhibition at the NTT InterCommunication Center
NTT InterCommunication Center
NTT InterCommunication Center is a media art gallery in Tokyo Opera City Tower in Shinjuku, Tokyo, Japan. It was established by NTT to commemorate the 100th anniversary of telephone service in Japan and opened in 1997...
in Tokyo. From 1998 to 2001 he was Artist in Residence at Mixed Reality Systems Laboratory in Yokohama
Yokohama
is the capital city of Kanagawa Prefecture and the second largest city in Japan by population after Tokyo and most populous municipality of Japan. It lies on Tokyo Bay, south of Tokyo, in the Kantō region of the main island of Honshu...
, Japan.
Video games
Iwai is the first internationally-recognized gallery artist also to have led the creation of several successful commercial video game projects. This cross-disciplinary ability typifies Iwai's career.Iwai's first game was the musical shoot 'em up
Shoot 'em up
Shoot 'em up is a subgenre of shooter video games. In a shoot 'em up, the player controls a lone character, often in a spacecraft or aircraft, shooting large numbers of enemies while dodging their attacks. The genre in turn encompasses various types or subgenres and critics differ on exactly what...
Otocky
Otocky
Otocky is a videogame released in 1987 for the Family Computer Disk System in Japan. Developed by SEDIC and published by ASCII Corporation, the game was conceived and designed by Toshio Iwai.-Gameplay:...
(1987), produced in association with ASCII Corporation for the Famicom Disk System, an add-on for the NES
Nintendo Entertainment System
The Nintendo Entertainment System is an 8-bit video game console that was released by Nintendo in North America during 1985, in Europe during 1986 and Australia in 1987...
available only in Japan. The game is notable for being the first to include creative/procedural generative music
Generative music
Generative music is a term popularized by Brian Eno to describe music that is ever-different and changing, and that is created by a system.- Theory :There are four primary perspectives on "Generative Music" Generative music is a term popularized by Brian Eno to describe music that is ever-different...
. Through association with different game mechanics and player actions, the game plays quantized-in-time
Quantization (music)
In digital music processing technology, quantization is the process of transforming performed musical notes to an underlying musical representation that eliminates this imprecision. The process results in notes being set on beats and on exact fractions of beats...
musical notes in a variety of digitally synthesized voices
Digital synthesizer
A digital synthesizer is a synthesizer that uses digital signal processing techniques to make musical sounds.Electronic keyboards make music through sound waves.-History:...
. Otocky is a precursor of Rez
Rez
Rez, developed under the codename K-Project, Project Eden, and Vibes, is a rail shooter video game released by Sega in Japan in 2001 for the Dreamcast and PlayStation 2, with a European Dreamcast release and United States PlayStation 2 release in 2002...
, Tetsuya Mizuguchi
Tetsuya Mizuguchi
is a video game designer and founder of the video game development firm Q Entertainment. He formerly worked for Sega were he eventually became the head of their United Game Artists division...
's 2002 Dreamcast and PlayStation 2
PlayStation 2
The PlayStation 2 is a sixth-generation video game console manufactured by Sony as part of the PlayStation series. Its development was announced in March 1999 and it was first released on March 4, 2000, in Japan...
game exploring similar themes of player action and musical evolution.
Later, leveraging work done on the 1993 installation art project Music Insects at San Francisco's Exploratorium
Exploratorium
The Exploratorium is a museum in San Francisco with over 475 participatory exhibits, all of them made onsite, that mix science and art. It also aims to promote museums as informal education centers....
, Iwai created another sound-based game in 1994 for the Super Famicom
Super Nintendo Entertainment System
The Super Nintendo Entertainment System is a 16-bit video game console that was released by Nintendo in North America, Europe, Australasia , and South America between 1990 and 1993. In Japan and Southeast Asia, the system is called the , or SFC for short...
system called Sound Fantasy
Sound Fantasy
Sound Fantasy also titled Sound Factory during production, is an unreleased video game for the Super NES/Super Famicom.-Summary:Interactive media artist Toshio Iwai designed the game in the early 1990s using concepts from the installation art piece Music Insects, which he created during his time as...
. In the game animated insects traverse a grid containing colored dots. As the insects pass over the dots, musical scales, sounds, and graphical effects are triggered. The player can select colors from a palette and paint on the grid, triggering new results and changing the insects' direction, improvising a visual music
Visual music
Visual music, sometimes called "colour music," refers to the use of musical structures in visual imagery, which can also include silent films or silent Lumia work. It also refers to methods or devices which can translate sounds or music into a related visual presentation...
performance. However, the game's release was cancelled and it was eventually converted into the PC title SimTunes
SimTunes
SimTunes is a children's software toy designed by Toshio Iwai and released by Maxis in 1996. It involves painting a picture with dots , where each color represents a musical note...
, published by Maxis
Maxis
Maxis is an American company founded as an independent video game developer in 1987. It is currently a subsidiary of Electronic Arts . Maxis is the creator of one of the best-selling computer games of all time, The Sims and its first sequel, The Sims 2...
, a division of Electronic Arts
Electronic Arts
Electronic Arts, Inc. is a major American developer, marketer, publisher and distributor of video games. Founded and incorporated on May 28, 1982 by Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer games industry and was notable for promoting the designers and programmers...
.
In 2000, Iwai worked to publish , a collaborative drawing game that became the PlayStation 2
PlayStation 2
The PlayStation 2 is a sixth-generation video game console manufactured by Sony as part of the PlayStation series. Its development was announced in March 1999 and it was first released on March 4, 2000, in Japan...
's first mouse-compatible title. This was followed in 2001 by the limited-edition release of a simple step sequencer, , for the WonderSwan
WonderSwan
was a line of handheld game consoles produced in Japan by Bandai between 1999 and 2003. It was developed by the late Gunpei Yokoi's company Koto and Bandai...
. This non-game
Non-game
Non-games define a class of software that lies on the border between video games, toys and applications. The original term non-game game was coined by Nintendo president Satoru Iwata. The main difference between non-games and traditional video games is the apparent lack of goals, objectives and...
would be the precursor to the more advanced 2005 version released together with Yamaha.
Iwai's acclaimed Electroplankton
Electroplankton
Electroplankton is an interactive music video game developed by Toshio Iwai and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo DS handheld video game console. It was first released in Japan, and was later released in North America and Europe. This game allows the player to interact with animated plankton...
for the Nintendo DS
Nintendo DS
The is a portable game console produced by Nintendo, first released on November 21, 2004. A distinctive feature of the system is the presence of two separate LCD screens, the lower of which is a touchscreen, encompassed within a clamshell design, similar to the Game Boy Advance SP...
was released in Japan in 2005 and in Europe and North America in 2006. A suite of ten different interactive music and audio toys themed around cartoon plankton
Plankton
Plankton are any drifting organisms that inhabit the pelagic zone of oceans, seas, or bodies of fresh water. That is, plankton are defined by their ecological niche rather than phylogenetic or taxonomic classification...
and using the novel touchscreen
Touchscreen
A touchscreen is an electronic visual display that can detect the presence and location of a touch within the display area. The term generally refers to touching the display of the device with a finger or hand. Touchscreens can also sense other passive objects, such as a stylus...
and microphone
Microphone
A microphone is an acoustic-to-electric transducer or sensor that converts sound into an electrical signal. In 1877, Emile Berliner invented the first microphone used as a telephone voice transmitter...
interface features of the Nintendo DS, Electroplankton draws heavily on Iwai's earlier work, including Composition on the Table.
Games designed by Toshio Iwai
- OtockyOtockyOtocky is a videogame released in 1987 for the Family Computer Disk System in Japan. Developed by SEDIC and published by ASCII Corporation, the game was conceived and designed by Toshio Iwai.-Gameplay:...
(1987; Famicom Disk System) - Sound FantasySound FantasySound Fantasy also titled Sound Factory during production, is an unreleased video game for the Super NES/Super Famicom.-Summary:Interactive media artist Toshio Iwai designed the game in the early 1990s using concepts from the installation art piece Music Insects, which he created during his time as...
(canceled; Super FamicomSuper Nintendo Entertainment SystemThe Super Nintendo Entertainment System is a 16-bit video game console that was released by Nintendo in North America, Europe, Australasia , and South America between 1990 and 1993. In Japan and Southeast Asia, the system is called the , or SFC for short...
) - SimTunesSimTunesSimTunes is a children's software toy designed by Toshio Iwai and released by Maxis in 1996. It involves painting a picture with dots , where each color represents a musical note...
(1996, PCPersonal computerA personal computer is any general-purpose computer whose size, capabilities, and original sales price make it useful for individuals, and which is intended to be operated directly by an end-user with no intervening computer operator...
) (2000, PlayStation 2PlayStation 2The PlayStation 2 is a sixth-generation video game console manufactured by Sony as part of the PlayStation series. Its development was announced in March 1999 and it was first released on March 4, 2000, in Japan...
) (2001, WonderSwanWonderSwanwas a line of handheld game consoles produced in Japan by Bandai between 1999 and 2003. It was developed by the late Gunpei Yokoi's company Koto and Bandai...
) - ElectroplanktonElectroplanktonElectroplankton is an interactive music video game developed by Toshio Iwai and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo DS handheld video game console. It was first released in Japan, and was later released in North America and Europe. This game allows the player to interact with animated plankton...
(2005, Nintendo DSNintendo DSThe is a portable game console produced by Nintendo, first released on November 21, 2004. A distinctive feature of the system is the presence of two separate LCD screens, the lower of which is a touchscreen, encompassed within a clamshell design, similar to the Game Boy Advance SP...
)
Television
In 1990 Iwai's solo show Machine for Trinity exhibited at the Laforet Museum in Tokyo; some of the works shown there demonstrated that computer graphicsComputer graphics
Computer graphics are graphics created using computers and, more generally, the representation and manipulation of image data by a computer with help from specialized software and hardware....
could be generated and combined in real-time with live action
Live action
In filmmaking, video production, and other media, the term live action refers to cinematography, videography not produced using animation...
images. The TV director Shinji Fukuhara visited the exhibition and shortly afterward contracted Iwai to create concepts and a virtual set for a weekly half-hour science news show Einstein TV (Fuji TV, 1990–91). Created on the Amiga
Amiga
The Amiga is a family of personal computers that was sold by Commodore in the 1980s and 1990s. The first model was launched in 1985 as a high-end home computer and became popular for its graphical, audio and multi-tasking abilities...
, the virtual set included GUI
Gui
Gui or guee is a generic term to refer to grilled dishes in Korean cuisine. These most commonly have meat or fish as their primary ingredient, but may in some cases also comprise grilled vegetables or other vegetarian ingredients. The term derives from the verb, "gupda" in Korean, which literally...
-like pop-up menus.
This led to more work with Fuji TV the following year in the development of the daily interactive children's show Ugo Ugo Lhuga (1992–94). Influenced by Pee-wee's Playhouse
Pee-wee's Playhouse
Pee-wee's Playhouse is an American children's television program starring Paul Reubens as the child-like Pee-wee Herman. The show was developed from Reubens' popular stage show and the one-off TV special The Pee-wee Herman Show, produced for HBO, which was similar in style but featured much more...
, which Iwai had seen during his tenure at the Exploratorium
Exploratorium
The Exploratorium is a museum in San Francisco with over 475 participatory exhibits, all of them made onsite, that mix science and art. It also aims to promote museums as informal education centers....
in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, the show was imaginative and irreverent and featured talking TVs, a tomato that gave advice to call-in guests, a robot named Robot that asked riddles and broke down when given silly answers, anthropomorphic faeces named Professor Poo Poo, and a cubo-surrealist artist named Surr. Ugo Ugo Lhuga is 'go-go girls' anagrammed in Japanese.
A central concept of the show was that two live-action main characters would appear to interact with the sets and characters of a virtual world
Virtual world
A virtual world is an online community that takes the form of a computer-based simulated environment through which users can interact with one another and use and create objects. The term has become largely synonymous with interactive 3D virtual environments, where the users take the form of...
. Instead of generating the virtual characters first and orchestrating the actions of the live-action cast to fit pre-rendered
Pre-rendered
Pre-rendering is the process in which video footage is not rendered in real-time by the hardware that is outputing or playing back the video. Instead, the video is a recording of a footage that was previously rendered on a different equipment...
imagery, the characters were generated and composited
Compositing
Compositing is the combining of visual elements from separate sources into single images, often to create the illusion that all those elements are parts of the same scene. Live-action shooting for compositing is variously called "chroma key", "blue screen", "green screen" and other names. Today,...
in real-time with minimal post-production
Post-production
Post-production is part of filmmaking and the video production process. It occurs in the making of motion pictures, television programs, radio programs, advertising, audio recordings, photography, and digital art...
. At first the shows were pre-recorded, but after the first six months cast and crew were confident enough to perform live
Live television
Live television refers to a television production broadcast in real-time, as events happen, in the present. From the early days of television until about 1958, live television was used heavily, except for filmed shows such as I Love Lucy and Gunsmoke. Video tape did not exist until 1957...
.
To enhance the live-broadcast appeal of the show, Iwai helped devise a call-in sumo
Sumo
is a competitive full-contact sport where a wrestler attempts to force another wrestler out of a circular ring or to touch the ground with anything other than the soles of the feet. The sport originated in Japan, the only country where it is practiced professionally...
match. Children from across Japan sent in drawings of sumo wrestlers on postcards, which Iwai scanned. During the program the audience called in and, watching their televisions at home, shouted into the telephone; the louder they shouted the stronger their sumo wrestler became, finally pushing the opposing wrestler out of the dohyō
Dohyo
thumb|A dohyōThe dohyō is the ring in which sumo wrestling bouts are held. A modern dohyo is a circle of rice-straw bales 4.55 meters in diameter, mounted on a square platform of clay 6.7m on a side, and 34 to 60 cm high. The surface is covered by sand.A new dohyō is built prior to each...
.
Performances and public lectures
In 1996 and 1997 Iwai collaborated with musician and composer Ryuichi SakamotoRyuichi Sakamoto
After working as a session musician with Haruomi Hosono and Yukihiro Takahashi in 1977, the trio formed the internationally successful electronic music band Yellow Magic Orchestra in 1978. Known for their seminal influence on electronic music, the group helped pioneer electronic genres such as...
to create the multimedia stage performance Music Plays Images x Images Play Music. The performance included use of Iwai's installation Piano - As Image Media and a version of Resonance of 4 adapted to use a chessboard
Chessboard
A chessboard is the type of checkerboard used in the board game chess, and consists of 64 squares arranged in two alternating colors...
-like interface.
In June 2004 Iwai gave a prestigious invited public lecture at the 4th International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression
New Interfaces for Musical Expression
New Interfaces for Musical Expression, also known as NIME, is an international conference dedicated to scientific research on the development of new technologies for musical expression and artistic performance...
, held in Hamamatsu, Japan.
Museum design
Created during his time as an Artist-in-Residence at the ExploratoriumExploratorium
The Exploratorium is a museum in San Francisco with over 475 participatory exhibits, all of them made onsite, that mix science and art. It also aims to promote museums as informal education centers....
in San Francisco, California, Iwai's works Well of Lights (1992) and Music Insects (1992) are part of the Exploratorium's permanent collection.
Iwai contributed to the construction of the Bouncing Totoro
My Neighbor Totoro
, is a 1988 Japanese animated fantasy film written and directed by Hayao Miyazaki and produced by Studio Ghibli. The film follows the two young daughters of a professor and their interactions with friendly wood spirits in postwar rural Japan...
3-dimensional zoetrope at the Ghibli Museum
Ghibli Museum
is a museum featuring the Japanese anime work of Studio Ghibli, and is located in Inokashira Park in Mitaka, a western suburb of Tokyo, Japan.The museum is a fine arts museum, but does not take the concept of a usual fine arts museum. With many features that are child-oriented and a sprawling and...
in Mitaka, Tokyo. He helped conceive an LED strobe device to be used in place of conventional strobe lights, softening the lighting as a result. He also made a layout plan for the positioning of the figures using a computer.
Digital musical instrument design
A current project of Iwai's, in collaboration with Yamaha CorporationYamaha (manufacturer)
is a multinational corporation and conglomerate based in Japan with a wide range of products and services, predominantly musical instruments, electronics, motorcycles and power sports equipment.-History:...
, is the creation of a new interactive digital musical instrument. Called Tenori-on
Tenori-on
Tenori-on is an electronic musical instrument, designed and created by Japanese artist Toshio Iwai and Yu Nishibori of the Music and Human Interface Group, Yamaha Center for Advanced Sound Technology. It consists of a screen, held in the hands, of a sixteen by sixteen grid of LED switches, any of...
, the instrument is a sixteen-by-sixteen array of illuminated LED
LEd
LEd is a TeX/LaTeX editing software working under Microsoft Windows. It is a freeware product....
switches which can be activated in a variety of ways to create a changing musical soundscape
Soundscape
A soundscape is a sound or combination of sounds that forms or arises from an immersive environment. The study of soundscape is the subject of acoustic ecology...
.
Tenori-on was showcased throughout its development through stage and conference performances. It went on sale in the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
on 4 September 2007.
Influences and connections
- Norman McLarenNorman McLarenNorman McLaren, CC, CQ was a Scottish-born Canadian animator and film director known for his work for the National Film Board of Canada...
- Thomas WilfredThomas WilfredThomas Wilfred born Richard Edgar Løvstrom, was a musician and inventor. He is best known for his visual music he named lumia and his designs for color organs called Clavilux...
's Lumia - Visual musicVisual musicVisual music, sometimes called "colour music," refers to the use of musical structures in visual imagery, which can also include silent films or silent Lumia work. It also refers to methods or devices which can translate sounds or music into a related visual presentation...
- Color organColor organThe term color organ refers to a tradition of mechanical , then electromechanical, devices built to represent sound or to accompany music in a visual medium—by any number of means. In the early 20th century, a silent color organ tradition developed...
- Mary Hallock-GreenewaltMary Hallock-GreenewaltMary Elizabeth Hallock-Greenewalt was an inventor and pianist who performed with the Philadelphia and Pittsburgh symphonies as a soloist...
- Oskar FischingerOskar FischingerOskar Fischinger was a German-American abstract animator, filmmaker, and painter. He made over 50 short animated films, and painted c. 800 canvases, many of which are in museums, galleries and collections worldwide. Among his film works is Motion Painting No. 1 , which is now listed on the...
- Color organ
- Aleatoric musicAleatoric musicAleatoric music is music in which some element of the composition is left to chance, and/or some primary element of a composed work's realization is left to the determination of its performer...
- Generative musicGenerative musicGenerative music is a term popularized by Brian Eno to describe music that is ever-different and changing, and that is created by a system.- Theory :There are four primary perspectives on "Generative Music" Generative music is a term popularized by Brian Eno to describe music that is ever-different...
- Brian EnoBrian EnoBrian Peter George St. John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno , commonly known as Brian Eno or simply as Eno , is an English musician, composer, record producer, singer and visual artist, known as one of the principal innovators of ambient music.Eno studied at Colchester Institute art school in Essex,...
- Brian Eno
- Interactive music
- Conway's game of lifeConway's Game of LifeThe Game of Life, also known simply as Life, is a cellular automaton devised by the British mathematician John Horton Conway in 1970....
- PongPongPong is one of the earliest arcade video games, and is a tennis sports game featuring simple two-dimensional graphics. While other arcade video games such as Computer Space came before it, Pong was one of the first video games to reach mainstream popularity...
- Open-ended Gameplay
- Will Wright
Quotes
"I've been longing for the feeling of my childhood in the digital world and that is why I've been sticking to relations among media, machine(s), and people through interactive works.""All of his work is sincere, and all consists of equal doses of seriousness and play, pathos and humor, intricacy and simplicity." - Azby Brown
Notable works
Installations- Time Stratum IV 1990
- Another Time, Another Space NHK version 1994
- Resonance of 4 1994
- Piano - As Image Media 1995
- Composition on the Table 1998/99
- Shanghai World Financial Center, Observation Deck 2008
Permanent Exhibits
- Well of Lights Exploratorium, 1992
- Music Insects Exploratorium, 1992
- Another Time, Another Space, National Museum of Photography, Film and Television (now the National Media Museum), Bradford, UK 1999
Videogames
- OtockyOtockyOtocky is a videogame released in 1987 for the Family Computer Disk System in Japan. Developed by SEDIC and published by ASCII Corporation, the game was conceived and designed by Toshio Iwai.-Gameplay:...
1986 - SimTunesSimTunesSimTunes is a children's software toy designed by Toshio Iwai and released by Maxis in 1996. It involves painting a picture with dots , where each color represents a musical note...
1996 - ElectroplanktonElectroplanktonElectroplankton is an interactive music video game developed by Toshio Iwai and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo DS handheld video game console. It was first released in Japan, and was later released in North America and Europe. This game allows the player to interact with animated plankton...
2005
Television
- Einstein TV 1990-91
- Ugo Ugo Lhuga 1992-94
Performance
- Music Plays Images x Images Play Music 1996-97
Digital Musical Instrument Design
- Tenori-onTenori-onTenori-on is an electronic musical instrument, designed and created by Japanese artist Toshio Iwai and Yu Nishibori of the Music and Human Interface Group, Yamaha Center for Advanced Sound Technology. It consists of a screen, held in the hands, of a sixteen by sixteen grid of LED switches, any of...
Books, magazines and printed matters
- Artist, Designer and Director SCAN (Rikuyosha, 2000)
- 100 Floors House (Kaiseisha, 2008)
- Docchiga!? Books (Books KInokuniya, 2006)
Others
- Docchi Ga Hen? poster (Tokyu Railways, 2007–2008)