Paul Baron and Olivier Thereaux met at a blogger’s meeting in Tokyo’s Harajuku a few years ago. Paul - at that time working as an interaction designer for Honda R&D - was still new in Tokyo, where as Olivier had already been working for the W3C for several years. Together they realized that there wasn’t any really comprehensive guide to art and design in Tokyo, nothing bilingual and nothing listing more than only a few venues at a time. That was when they decided to create Tokyo Art Beat, Tokyo’s online Art&Design Events Calendar.
Interview by Uleshka
Once you’ve seen the Tokyo Art Beat website, you won’t need to search for art and design related events in Tokyo any longer - you list more than 400 venues, have got all the timetables, maps and really good search functionality, all together, free for everybody! I am very impressed!
Paul: The idea was actually to show the true picture of what is happening in Tokyo, rather than only listing the few most frequently mentioned galleries and museums. We wanted to show that there is so much variety, not only for the visitors, the sellers or art professionals, but also for the artists themselves, to they see how much opportunity they have to show their work. Providing all the information in Japanese and English also opens the Tokyo art scene for foreigners, tourists coming to Japan or art lovers wanting to test the Japanese art scene from abroad.
TAB top page
TAB search functions
It’s been almost a year, since you launched. How many were you in the beginning and how many are you now?
Olivier: We started in November 2003 being 3 people, by October 2004 there were about 10 people interested in helping and we are now more than 25 volunteers… Over the year, we developed the website and extended the network of people helping. What is important is to gather information from everywhere in a way that is sufficient. In the beginning, we thought we could do it somehow automatically, but we soon realized that we needed actual people to gather information for us - which is nicer, but more work. (smiles)
Who did what, when you started to build the website?
Paul and Olivier
Olivier: Paul was designing the interface and worked out the information architecture…
Paul: And Olivier did all the programming and backend stuff, but we actually we did everything together.
What was your main focus in the way you present the information to the users?
O: For us, it was very important not to select or favour certain events, but to show everything that’s there and let the visitor choose. You can choose to browse by media (e.g. only find photography-events) or search certain areas (e.g. finding events close to where you currently are). We are trying to help people find what they want, without pushing them. However, some people want more guidance, they want a recommendation.
Well- you have “Today’s Pick” and the “Most Popular” section.
Most Popular- section on the front page
My TAB
O: Yes, the Most Popular is a newer feature, though. We have a growing user base, so we decided to use that… You can create your own MyTAB and mark events, save your favorite venues and send event email-reminders to yourself. The more users mark an event as a “want to see”, the more popular it gets.
P: So the users tell the other users what they like, which is really how it should be.
You have a lot of nice features on your website. Your events can even be traced on Google maps! And I noticed, that some museums agreed on a discount on your entry ticket, if you print out the event information from the TAB website. Now there are many things for you to look after in addition to ensuring regular updates and finding more exhibitions, translating….. How do you keep up with all that?
TAB venues on Google maps
TAB venues on Google maps
P: The relationship between the venues and us is working, the website is working, our team of volunteers is doing a great job, but as we gain populatiry it puts more pressure on our work, demands more perfection and that is something that eventually will be too demanding for our structure as it is now. We are thinking of ways to stabalize our structure, though.
TAB is entirely free for everyone to use- and you are currently not making any money out of it. How are you going to keep up with increasing work and a growing demand for more workers?
O: We have been going through all the procedures of creating an NPO, so that will hopefully prove that we are a bit more professional and not just a bunch of friends maintaining a website. Sponsors welcome!!!
If you compared Tokyo to the London art scene- are there any significant differences between them?
P: I guess they both work in the same model, in a way. There are two kinds of clearly separated venues: the museums on one side and the galleries on the other, the world of exhibiting and the world of selling art.
On TAB, you don’t realize the difference, though, unless you pay attention. You just find the art.
P: That was the goal.
TAB can also be seen with Japanese mobile phones
various alternative search options
Having galleries and museums together, what about art and design together. I know, it is the old question and it seems to get more an more difficult to draw a line between art and design…. So what is **your** opinion about that?
P: (Laughs) I guess part of my little pleasure in this website is to put all kinds of people together who don’t want to be together: museums and galleries, art and design. Designers who call themselves artists together with the artists who only really do design. Since nobody is able to explain the difference clearly to me, I figured we just put them together.
What has changed in the Japanese art scene in the last few years?
Paul
Olivier
O: Now that is difficult … the only big obvious trend I could point out, is, that there are both foreign and Japanese artists exhibiting in Tokyo, where as there is a growing pride and a bigger support for Japanese artists now. In the 80s and 90s, foreign artists were the stars but the stars of today are certainly Japanese.
P: But even though Japan’s Coolness is very powerful in Japan and abroad, galleries seem to be struggling. There were quite a few closures in the last 6 months and big changes are happening right now. (insider information ;-) For sure, there is no growing trend in galleries, right now.
Can you see a trend in the way exhibitions are promoted? I mean, giving stronger themes to exhibitions like interaction, story telling, an exhibition to touch, or the current “breathing exhibition” showing at Kawamura Memorial Museum of Art?
O: Yes, definitely. It is a way to channel people, to make more people interested in art by making it easier for them to hold on to a theme. It all comes down to entertainment, but instead of giving them entertainment, which doesn’t go anywhere, you give them entertainment which leads them to art.
What is your vision for TAB?
O: Our vision remains the same, and that is to bring culture, art and design to everyone- for free! Of course we’d love to do it in other cities or countries one day, but we just go little by little.
Thank you very much!
Paul gathering all his stuff and …
Olivier… laughing
P: Thank you, too! And oh! please mention our one year anniversary party at Super Deluxe on the 8th of October!
I will!
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