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Tracing Sustainability at the Aichi Triennale 2025 in Japan

Sustainability and Positionality

The world we live in is shaped by a growing number of crises—e. g. climate crisis, (military) conflicts, and strengthening of the far right—that are increasingly proliferating on a global scale and effect the world as a planetary whole, unsettling certainties and fostering feelings of alienation, disorientation, awkwardness and social isolation. With regard to approaching and already exceeded tipping points or old and new manifestations of injustice, fast, systematic, and sustainable action is desperately needed. However, we seem to have approached a state of existence characterized by almost paralyzing attempts to preserve and stabilize what must be considered main causes for the very situation we are trapped in: an economic and social order following a narrative of progress through growth and, thus, favoring modernization as the path towards sustainable futures1.

Works of art are usually designed to transport an idea and to find a specific, individual expression for it. They aim at both making sense of pragmatic reality and reshaping it and are increasingly evolving into a space of contestation for matters of sustainability. Similarly, art exhibitions increasingly put sustainability on their agenda. In Japan, this trend can be observed at seminal exhibitions of Tokyo’s leading Art Museums, such as Our Ecology: Toward a Planetary Living, held from October 19, 2023 – March 31, 2024 at the Mori Art Museum as its 20th anniversary exhibition, and Prism of the Real: Making Art in Japan 1989–2010, held from September 3 – December 8, 2025 at The National Art Center, Tokyo (NACT). And it is also perceivable at urban and rural art festivals throughout the country.

In this blog article I will reflect on my trip to the 2025 Aichi Triennale, held mainly in Nagoya, one of Japan’s largest cities located in Aichi Prefecture. This art festival is well established and attracts domestic as well as international visitors. I investigate how it approaches cultural, social and ecological aspects of sustainability.

I am a scholar trained in Theatre Studies and Japanese Studies. My current research is on disabilities in contemporary Japan and its literature. Considering disability as a phenomenon that is at once socially constructed and an individual experience, I argue that disability is both complexly intertwined with issues of socio-ecological sustainability2 and it in and of itself is a matter of sustainability3. Accordingly, I will also have a closer look at how the art festival pays attention to disability with regard to contents, access, and knowledge.

I am severely visual impaired. Even though my vision is low, my perception neither must be misunderstood as reduced or (almost) lacking nor should it be considered as hindering or limiting my ability to engage with art. And it is a perception that testifies experiential knowledge that informs, shapes, even creates this research. It does so not only with regard to topics and theoretical approaches, but “on the very epistemological level” of methodology4.

This article includes numerous photographs5 taken at the art festival by my husband Norbert Heininger. Just as with other methods such as closer looks, touching, using my mobile phone’s magnifier mode, and not least conversation, these photographs are an aid enabling me to encounter artworks more nuancedly and to get an idea of details, materials, layers of color, brush stroke, etc. The photographs do not only illustrate this article, but they are an integral part of it. They are in conversation with the written text.

As stated by Georgina Kleege in her groundbreaking monography More than Meets the Eye: What Blindness Brings to Art, whether blind and other disabled people are present in art facilities is not a mere matter of accessibility, but of fundamental civil and human rights: “In some sense, when blind people show up at an art museum, we assert that we have a place in this society and a right to public institutions.”6

Art Festivals and Their Political Dimension

While regional art festivals might be considered as an aspect of revitalization of local communities, neighbourhoods or municipalities, it is crucial not to romanticize or idealize them or to consider these as disconnected from socioeconomic motivations and forces. So, “with increasing popularity throughout the 2000s”—as Eimi Tagore elaborates—many of them “have inevitably become commercialized, top-down initiatives by the state and large corporations.”7 Also, their effects on local communities and participating artists are by no means entirely positive.8 And they are neither apolitical nor unpoliticized, but touching upon geostrategic considerations9, international relations, politics of remembrance, etc.

This can also be encountered at conceptual and thematic levels of art festivals, as exemplified by the well-known case of the Aichi Triennale 2019 curated by activist Tsuda Daisuke 津田大介 (born 1973). That year’s Triennale was regarded as extraordinarily political and provoked debate about its extra show room named “Hyōgen no fujiyū-ten: Sono ato” 表現の不自由展・その後 (After Freedom of Expression) that exhibited portraiture of the Shōwa tennō and an artefact addressing the so-called comfort women (ianfu 慰安婦), and even more for combining these controversial realia of fascist Japan. Sound trucks, telephone harassment and other actions by the (far) right followed. As a consequence, the special section was closed, budget cuts were demanded, and concerns about censorship and the freedom of the arts were raised. Countering this impertinence, Takayama Akira 高山明 (born 1969) started a project committed to designing answer cards for those handling complaints at museums and other arts facilities.10

In the following sections, I will briefly introduce the Aichi Triennale. Then I will reflect upon issues of sustainability that I encountered at my fieldtrip to this major art festival.

The Aichi Triennale 2025

The Aichi Triennale (Kokusai Geijutsusai Aichi 国際芸術祭あいち) is one of Japan’s largest international art festivals, established in 2010. In 2025 the Aichi Triennale was held from September 13 – November 30, 2025 at three main venues: the Aichi Arts Center in the center of Nagoya, the capital of Aichi Prefecture inhabited by 2.3 million people, the Aichi Prefectural Ceramic Museum in the city of Seto, and numerous locations in Seto. It was curated by Hoor Al Qasimi (born 1980) and consisted of exhibitions, performances, and lectures11.

Highly acclaimed as an art manager internationally and possessing strong ties to Japan and its culture, Al Qasimi was the first international artistic director of the Aichi Triennale. A Time Between Ashes and Roses (Hai to bara no aima ni 灰と薔薇のあいまに), the title she gave her Aichi Triennale, refers to a poem by the Syrian poet Adonis (born 1930). At the beginning of her opening statement on the Aichi Triennale 2025’s performing arts bulletin, Al Qasimi states that in this poem, written after the Six Day War of 1967, “Adonis lamented the environmental destruction of his surroundings, questioning the overwhelming presence of ashes in the Arab World” and outlines a combination of the most beautiful (roses) and most devastating (ashes by war) things cultivated by humanity. The poem engages with the traumatizing experience of war and articulates hopes for change, as represented through the comforting notion of renewal that must follow destruction.13 Elsewhere in the bulletin, Al Qasimi also emphasizes the poetic quality of Adonis’ words and considers how it can serve as an approach to our contemporary world and the Aichi Triennale 2025:

This year’s concept carries significant weight, and I believe it reflects the sense of heaviness present in the world today. I chose to reference Adonis’s phrase “Ashes and Roses” because of its poetic resonance. In the past, there may have been a chance to cultivate a positive relationship between humanity and the environment, but instead, we’ve continued to destroy it. Yet, as Adonis articulates, even in the wake of total destruction, something new can still emerge.13

Al Qasimi’s Aichi Triennale has a strong focus on non-Western international art. Therefore, it counters the still privileged position of European and American artists and artworks within the art scene of Japan. Al Qasimi herself stated that the diversity of artists her Aichi Triennale features represents how her world and the world itself is14. Her decision must thus be considered an intended step towards justice in the arts.

However, the non-Western international artists exhibited at Aichi Triennale 2025 are neither newcomers nor unknowns. They have been showcased at reputable museums and galleries around the world. Before the Aichi Triennale 2025, I have, for example, already seen installations by Dala Nasser (born 1990) in Helsinki in May 2025.

My fieldtrip to the Aichi Triennale was on October 12 – 13, 2025. I saw the exhibition at the Aichi Arts Center in Nagoya and a performance by Mayunkiki. This blog post focuses on the exhibition.

Exhibition: Sustainability in the Anthropocene

I will comment here on the exhibition held at the Aichi Arts Center, a cultural complex that was opened in 1992. Located in the center of Nagoya, this part of the Aichi Triennale 2025 was embedded in an urban environment and could be accessed by public transport. In its direct neighborhood there are a shopping center, numerous restaurants and cafés and open spaces to be used for chats, picnics, street art, gatherings, and small events.

The organizers of the Aichi Triennale 2025 aimed at making the event accessible to a wide audience. They provided accommodations for people with physical or sensory disabilities, a school program, a childcare service, comprehensive information on the event, showcased artists and works provided in print and online, and so-called relaxed performances.

While there is still room for further advancement, as the measures still leave accessibility needs open (e.g. information in Easy Japanese), the Aichi Triennale proves its dedication to socio-ecological sustainability not only at a conceptual level but in practice. This contesting of modes that manifest performances and the arts as a very serious, culturally high-standing matter serves all visitors regardless of their age or dis/ability. In addition, it also brings performances and the arts both closer to the people (i.e. diverse audiences) who are (or should be) the ones these are made for and more in line with their origins.

As already indicated by the topic A Time Between Ashes and Roses, the Aichi Triennale 2025 promotes sustainability as a path we humans must pursue to remedy the devastation we have brought to both the ecological environments we live in and to other humans. Imagined as mobilizing the logics of reason rather than of egoism and as utilizing equity and cooperation rather than power and exploitation, socio-ecological sustainability is introduced as a path towards a desirable future.

Many artists showcased at the Aichi Triennale 2025 pair traditional and novel techniques, materials and symbols signifying benevolent and malevolent aspects of human activities. I will now have a closer look at three of them. While my selection of artists is based on my interest and preference, it can also be regarded as representative of the Aichi Triennale in its diverse lineup. Out of the artists I will discuss one is from Japan, one from Indonesia and one from Sudan; two are female, one is male. Their works include paintings, sculptures, and installations.

Mulyana (born 1984), as stated in the description of his crochet installation Between Currents and Bloom, “has earned international recognition for works that address pressing global environmental issues with playfulness and imagination”.

Between Currents and Bloom, Mulyana. Photo taken by N. Heininger. CC BY-NC-ND.

Mulyana uses recycled material—such as plastic that otherwise cover ever larger areas of the oceans with sinuously growing fabric of human-made disposals—to model ideal seascapes crossed by colorful coral banks, populated by fish, sea stars, jellyfish, corals, and whale bones. Aiming to “replicate ‘the ideal sea as remembered’”, the artist eco-critically “reconstructs his vision of the sea and memories of marine life, while drawing attention to the need for environmental restoration in Indonesia.”

The work of Kawabe Naho 川辺ナホ (born 1976) comes into being under the banner of coal production. It is, thus, intricately intertwined with processes and ramifications of modernization as well as the socioeconomic transformations of late modernity in Japan and well beyond. Kawabe’s focus on coal relates to her biography, as she grew up in one of Japan’s prime regions of coal producers, Fukuoka Prefecture.

Insula, Kawabe Naho. Photo taken by N. Heininger. CC BY-NC-ND.

The Aichi Triennale 2025 supplementary material characterizes Kawabe as an artist with an interdisciplinary approach who works on various genres. In her “artistic practice, the outcomes of her historical and socio-cultural research focused on the topic of coal overlap with personal experiences in an attempt to reexamine contemporary social structures.” It frames her work as linked to contemporary environmental issues and as directed towards the creation of a livable future.

Kamala Ibrahim Ishag (born 1937) from Sudan is introduced to the Aichi Triennale as a “[p]ath-breaking artist” who “has had a profound impact on debates around modernist art in Africa”. The exhibition shows both her paintings and sculptures. More or less 40 years older than the other artists introduced here, she gives evidence to the transgenerationality of debates on socio-cultural sustainability in the arts and their long tradition.

Through her main motifs of trees—in their entirety as well as segmented as leaves, branches, stems, roots—and women’s faces, Ishag’s paintings and vase-shaped sculptures present nature and (female) humans as entirely interconnected. Both are considered a part of nature—sharing the soil as their origin, home and destination. This is consented by brown and green, the colors she uses predominantly. Brown are the soil, loam, and mud. Brown are the roots, the stem, and the branches of a tree. And brown are the women’s faces. Green are the leaves.

In Origins (2022), numerous women’s faces are painted at various positions in the many branches of a tree. Every single one of these faces stands pars pro toto for a woman, her life story, and experiences. At the same time, each of them is displayed as connected with any other and with nature alike. The multiplicity of women’s faces in this painting indicates that we humans by nature live in social relation with others, with siblings, parents, grandparents, and ancestors, with neighbors, friends, and peers. We live our lives connected to everybody who lives, has lived, and will live in this world. Also, we need to feel connected, and we need to feel that we belong to others, to places and spaces, as this is essential for our construction of selfhood16. In addition, the numerous women’s faces point to shared women’s experiences. This is detailed in the comment on Ishag’s works:

The women with distorted expressions and bodies depicted in her art hint at the trances fallen into by women possessed by spirits (zar), with this distortion, seemingly stemming from oppression, being caused by the person’s state of mind, life, or environment.

Composition, Kamala Ibrahim Ishag. Photo taken by N. Heininger. CC BY-NC-ND.

The works by Ishag reproduced here as photographs, are characterized by duplicity—may it be that of women’s faces in Composition or of trees in My Two Neems (2023). The latter My Two Neems depicts two Neem trees that were “planted on her father’s birthday and have lived in the garden for generations”. Infused by childhood memory, these two Neems—fast-growing, evergreen trees native to the Indian subcontinent and parts of Southeast Asia also grown in tropical and subtropical areas around the world that can be helpful (as food or traditional medicine) and harmful (as poison)—symbolize the ambivalent nature of anything existing in this world.

Now at the end of this section, I cannot neglect to mention one last aspect that most artists discussed here (and many others who exhibited at or performed in Nagoya) share: the motivation of their art stemming from some sort of first-person experience. Approaching a particular matter through first-person experiences or deriving from a memoir these works do not only contribute to a more realistic representation but also generate urgency that is articulated in artistic expression.

This tendency coincides with a recent boom of novels portraying a first-person experience of a specific condition (e.g. disability, sexual orientation or identity, socioeconomic deprivation)—such as Ichikawa Saō’s 市川沙央 Hanchibakku ハンチバック (2023), Murakami Haruki’s 村上春樹 Machi to sono futashikana kabe 街とその不確かな壁 (2023), Nagira Yū’s 凪良ゆう Nanji, hoshi no gotoku 汝、星のごとく (2022)—in the literature of contemporary Japan. In Japan, such literature is also known as tōjisha bungaku 当事者文学—a “literature” (bungaku 文学) that relies on the experience of a tōjisha 当事者, best understood as a “person [directly] concerned” with a specific condition16. This current is also present in various non-Japanese literatures17.

Closing Remarks

Nagoya, oftentimes overlooked by travelers rushing to other metropolitan centers, not considered a touristic destination and shaped by intense industrial production, owes the Triennale recognition in the arts scene and a significantly increased attractivity among domestic and international tourists. The Triennale has inscribed issues of sustainability into the DNA of the city and turned reflection on these—to some extent—into its ‘brand essence.’

And indeed, the Aichi Triennale 2025 was packed with countless artifacts that nuancedly negotiated sustainability in its complexity and diversity. Addressing cultural, social and ecological dimensions of sustainability and often also gaining inspiration and authority from personal experience, it validates sustainability as a matter of responsibility and of justice to give voice to the perspectives that are less prominent in most debates on eco-social sustainability.

Though the event highlights the capacity and will to stimulate debates and reflection and also successfully transferred insight into practice, some of the following questions should be kept in mind: Whose festival is it? For whom and by whom is it organized? How sustainable is it? Which questions are addressed, and which not? Does the investment pay off, or shouldn’t it be used to generate a more direct and sustainable output?

Carolin Fleischer-Heininger is a Senior Research Fellow at the German Institute for Japanese Studies (DIJ) Tokyo. Her research interests include disabilities in contemporary literature of Japan, constructions of post-war Japan in literature and culture, and cultures in/as translation.


  1. Adloff and Neckel conceptualize modernization, transformation, and control as “three possible ideal typical trajectories of social change” that are neither fixed nor unrelated, but “rather represent different and highly contested imaginaries of the future”. See: Adloff, Frank & Neckel, Sighard. 2019. “Futures of Sustainability as Modernization, Transformation, and Control: A Conceptual Framework.” Sustain Sci, 14, pp. 1015–1025. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11625-019-00671-2. ↩︎
  2. See for example Bell, Sarah L. & Jodoin, Sébastien et al. 2024. “Beyond the Single Story of Climate Vulnerability.” International Journal of Disability and Social Justice, 4 (2): pp. 48–70. https://doi.org/10.13169/intljofdissocjus.4.2.0048. ↩︎
  3. See the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): https://sdgs.un.org/goals. ↩︎
  4. See Bolt, David. 2021. “Prologue.” In: David Bolt ed. (2021): Metanarratives of Disability: Culture, Assumed Authority, and the Normative Social Order. London/New York: Routledge (eBook), n. p. ↩︎
  5. All photographs can be used under the terms of the CC BY-NC-ND open access license. ↩︎
  6. Kleege, Georgina. 2018. More than Meets the Eye: What Blindness Brings to Art. New York: Oxford Academic. https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780190604356.001.0001, p. 9. ↩︎
  7. Tagore, Eimi. 2024. “Art Festivals in Japan: Fueling Revitalization, Tourism, and Self-censorship.” Contemporary Japan, 36 (1), pp. 7–19. https://doi.org/10.1080/18692729.2024.2312762: p. 10. ↩︎
  8. Ibid., pp. 7–8. ↩︎
  9. Funck, Carolin & Qu, Meng. 2024. “Art Tourism and Paradigms of Island Revitalization in Japan.” Contemporary Japan, 36 (1), pp. 20–40. https://doi.org/10.1080/18692729.2024.2306112, pp. 22–24. ↩︎
  10. See Takayama Akira 高山明. 2021. Teatoron: Shakai to engeki o tsunagu mono テアトロン : 社会と演劇をつなぐもの. Tokyo: Kawade Shobō Shinsha. See also https://www.nhk.or.jp/bunken/research/focus/f20191001_4.html, https://www.tokyoreview.net/2020/05/aichi-triennale-2019-freedom-expression/. ↩︎
  11. See for the promotion video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDMGoXcubAQ ↩︎
  12. Kamjiō Keiko 上條桂子 & Nakamura Akane 中村茜 et al. eds. 2025. Pafomingu Aatsu: Kokusai geijutsusai ‚Aichi 2025‘ パフォミングアーツ:国際芸術祭「あいち2025」 / Performing Arts. Aichi Triennale 2025. Aichi Triennale Organizing Committee, p. 6. ↩︎
  13. Ibid., p. 104. ↩︎
  14. Al Qasimi, Hoor & Cassie Packard in interview. 2025.09.19. “‘This Is My World’: Hoor Al Qasimi on the Aichi Triennale.” Frieze. https://www.frieze.com/article/hoor-al-qasimi-2025-interview. ↩︎
  15. This is a very timely aspect, as during the last few decades the increase and chronic manifestation of loneliness have become a growing social problem in Japan as well as in many societies worldwide. ↩︎
  16. See Nakamura, Mariko 中村真理子. 2023. “Bungei kihyō: Tōjishasei to bungaku no shinmitsu-na kankei [Quarterly Review of Literature: The Intimate Relationship Between First-person Experience and Literature] 文芸季評:当事者性と文学の親密な関係”. Shōsetsu tripper (summer), pp. 308–311; McLelland, Mark. 2009. “The Role of the ‘tōjisha’ in Current Debates about Sexual Minority Rights in Japan.” Japanese Studies, 29 (2), pp. 193–207; Nakanishi, Shōji 中西正司 & Ueno Chizuko 上野千鶴子. 2023. Tōjjisha shuken 当事者主権. Tokyo: Iwanami. ↩︎
  17. For works drawing on first-person experience in non-Japanese literatures see Lügen über meine Mutter (2022) by Daniela Dröscher, Echtzeitalter (2023) by Tonio Schachinger, Die sexuellen Neurosen unserer Eltern (2003) by Lukas Bärfuss, En finir avec Eddy Belleguele (2014) by Edouard Louis, Le Bleu est une couleur chaude (2010) by Julie Maroh, Les Années (2008) by Annie Ernaux, Le Scaphandre et le Papillon (1997) by Jean-Dominique Bauby, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous (2019) by Ocean Vuong, Shuggie Bain (2020) by Douglas Stuart, and Shattered (2025) by Hanif Kureishi. ↩︎

OpenEdition suggests that you cite this post as follows:
Carolin Fleischer-Heininger (April 14, 2026). Tracing Sustainability at the Aichi Triennale 2025 in Japan. sustainability . Retrieved May 9, 2026 from https://sustainability.hypotheses.org/2415


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