hottamaru days

Cutting verbal expression to a bare minimum, hottamaru days explores “the meaning of dance”, expressed through “girls’ bodies” and “sounds caused by movement”. Satoko, the singer, lives in a small wooden house with four dancers. They live comfortably until one day, they discover another girl living inside their home. The title of this work hottamaru is an abbreviation derived from a phrase for “things that collect when left alone” (houtte oku to tamaru mono). The word implies the things our body sheds, such as hair, nails, skin from soles, as well as odors that accumulate in everyday life. The work is a “dancing film” in which the artist, who is a dancer herself, expresses unidentifiable feelings and sensations that flow out from deep within herself.

There is a refreshing sense of eroticism and fetishism. The transparent poetry is imbued with realistic touch. Utterly aesthetic, rejecting even a single slow-moving scene. Extremism and calmness, conflict and balance produce pleasures, which perhaps result from the interplay of “individuality” of the director YOSHIGAI Nao, a dancer, and that of the musician SHIBATA Satoko, who also performs in this work. While dealing with the modern theme of “the body as a medium”, this video, expressed in code that transcends language, arouses various stories and thoughts that surpass time and space. This work should be remembered as a “symbol” of the 2015 edition of girly pop. (KUDO Takeshi)