What Is War (2024)

Wen Hui (b. 1960) is Chinese and currently working in Europe. She grew up in China during the Cultural Revolution. Eiko Otake (b. 1952) is Japanese and lives in New York. She grew up in post-war Japan. Both are female performers/choreographers and filmmakers.

Commissioned by the Walker Art Center and CAP UCLA, Wen Hui and Eiko Otake are collaborating to create an evening length interdisciplinary piece What Is War to be premiered in the Walker in April 2025.

In January 2020, Eiko visited Wen Hui in China for a month. The pandemic obliged the artists to continue their dialogue in long distance. In the process of co-editing an award winning, feature length documentary film No Rule Is Our Rule, the artists began examining their personal memories they hold in their bodies. That quest led them to work together physically in the U.S. to co-create a new performance work What Is War.

In this project, projecting videos they filmed, Wen Hui and Eiko Otake perform and tell their personal memories related to wars both current and in history. They move on stage, their bodies intimately supporting and absorbing each other’s stories.

The artists hope this work will encourage the audience members to find their own stories about war that they are compelled to share with others.

For inquiries on the project please reach out to Eiko and Allison at info@eikootake.org.

3 minutes 45 seconds

A short video excerpt from a work-in-progress showing at Duke University

Camera by Jingqiu Guan
Edit by Eiko Otake and Wen Hui