Art is a verb, rather than a noun.
The KocoGarden Project is an ongoing participatory art installation located in the Koganecho neighbourhood of Yokohama, Japan. The complex and multi-layered history of Koganecho offers a unique ecosystem of diverse cultural and socio-economic relationships in which to plant a metaphoric garden for growing art and community.
Drawing from concepts of participatory art and Japanese アートプロジェク(art projects), the inter-collective project entitled "KocoGarden" by artists Ralph C. Lumbres and Ness Roque (Salikhain Kolektib, from the Philippines) and Steve Frost (Tasai Collective, from Canada) transforms Hatsune Wing A Gallery into a multipurpose, multi-sensory space for the Koganecho community of artists, staff, and the local neighborhood. With an ongoing program of activities since July 2023, KocoGarden offers opportunities for the continued sharing of ideas between artists and visitors throughout its run until the end of October, with the collective members opening the space to various artist-initiated activities that range from talks to casual hangouts, workshops to afternoon snacks. Emphasizing connection, collaboration, and conversation, the project is presented with drawings on the walls that serve as coloring books for visitors to work on, and video projections of previous activities that highlight the sense of camaraderie the project encourages.
~ Curator's Statement, Koganecho International Artists Network Exhibition, 2023
Artist's Statement
Koganecho Community Garden, or KocoGarden for short, is an experiment in transforming the white cube of a studio into an informal space which fosters interaction and a sense of belonging outside of home, or work. This kind of space—outside of the two main spheres of life—has been called a third space. This third space experiment began with the assertion that art is a verb, rather than a noun. It then explores what art-as-verb might look like, in a collaborative and participatory sense, outside of the solitude of an artist's studio. In a playful and whimsical twist, an actual artist studio was turned into the collaborative third space that is now KocoGarden.
KocoGarden is for the people who live and work around it. It’s for neighbours. In the Koganecho neighbourhood, a lot of our neighbours are artists participating in the Koganecho Artist In Residence Program. KocoGarden is also for local residents, some of whom have lived here their whole lives, and some of whom have been transplanted from other places.
KocoGarden is both a literal and metaphorical garden. It’s a physical communal space where you see grass, plants, animals, and trees. It is also the idea of a garden, where some neighbours are indigenous and have always been here. Some neighbours are transplanted from different places—Taiwan, Korea, Philippines, China, Belgium, Spain, Nepal, America, Thailand, Indonesia, Canada, to name a few. Just like a garden with indigenous and transplanted plants, Koganecho is a place for neighbours to co-live and grow together. KocoGarden is a place for lots of different kinds of people from lots of different cultures to see and appreciate each other’s beauty.
Kocogarden is a pop-up artist-run space hosted by two collectives: Tasai Collective (Vancouver, CA) and Salikahin Kolektib (Quezon City, PH). Since July, neighbouring artists-in-residence, shop-owners, friends, and strangers-turned-friends have used Kocogarden to host art events and happenings, dinners, meetings, yoga and meditation sessions, and countless parties. Others come to take afternoon naps, or just hangout here–a gathering space for wanderers who have found themselves here in Koganecho in the summer of 2023.