Performance
Performance
Live performances using custom-built projection devices and instruments to combine light, shadow, moving images, and sound in real time.
BLACK KITE – Pulsation of souls
トンビー魂の鼓動
2021
Live audiovisual performance
A work exploring the illegal dumping of industrial waste on Teshima and everyday life on the island today.
Duration 40 min
Performers Shinichi Hirai / Emi Hirai / Minagu Hirai
Language Japanese / English
[WATCH FULL PERFORMANCE →]
hug
2026
COLLABORATIVE PERFORMANCE
A collaborative work by usaginingen and Kenichiro Fujii of KRANK, presented at FORCHESTRA 2026.
Duration 15 min
Performers usaginingen / Kenichiro Fujii
Language Japanese
SONGS FOR US TO MEET
ぼくらが出会うためのうた
2024
COLLABORATIVE PERFORMANCE
An international collaboration with Papermoon Puppet Theatre exploring the cycle of life, death, and the ways in which one life sustains another. Combining puppetry, live music, and live cinema, the work premiered at the Museum of Art, Kochi, in 2024 and was subsequently performed at Pesta Boneka.
Duration 45 min
Performers Shinichi Hirai / Emi Hirai / Minagu Hirai / Papermoon Puppet Theatre members
Language Non-verbal
きせきのデイゴ
The Miracle of the Deigo Trees
2021
LIVE AUDIOVISUAL and VIDEO PERFORMANCE
A work based on stories collected from children in Okinawa. It began with a story told by Suzu, an elementary school student in Nago, about two deigo trees that survived when their school building burned down during the war.
Duration 15 min
Performers Shinichi Hirai / Emi Hirai
Video appearance Suzu-chan
Language Japanese
PENDULUM
振り子
2016
LIVE AUDIOVISUAL PERFORMANCE
A work that depicts a world of circulation and adjacency—light and shadow, intensity and calm—through the movement of a pendulum that shifts in width, colour, and form as it swings back and forth.
Duration 25 min
Performers Shinichi Hirai / Emi Hirai
Language Non-verbal
ANONYMOUS TRIP
2015
COLLABORATIVE THEATRE PERFORMANCE
A collaboration combining dance, moving images, and music. Two dancers explore shifts in their roles and identities as they find themselves in different situations. usaginingen created the visuals and music, performed live, and designed the costumes.
Duration 60 min
Performers usaginingen / Nobuyoshi Asai (Dancer) / Azusa Nishimura (Dancer)
Director Emi Miyoshi
Language Non-verbal
BIRTH
誕生
2014
LIVE AUDIOVISUAL PERFORMANCE
A work depicting the beginnings and endings of life, from the birth of stars and living beings through transformation, ageing, and death. It won the Grand Prix at the Reykjavík Visual-Music Festival in 2014.
Duration 30 min
Performers Shinichi Hirai / Emi Hirai
Language Non-verbal
MUNCHING
2012
LIVE AUDIOVISUAL PERFORMANCE
A work depicting the invisible “show inside the mouth,” where food changes shape and colour as we eat. Created for the Taste Festival in Berlin in 2012, it is one of usaginingen’s earliest performance works.
Duration 15 min
Performers Shinichi Hirai / Emi Hirai
Language Non-verbal
TA-CO
The “TA-CO” is a custom-built device for creating moving images in real time. It consists of transparent layers and a rotating drum. By placing various materials on the layers and operating a pedal to rotate the drum, we create moving images live.
SHIBAKI
“SHIBAKI” is an original instrument combining a percussion kit, a custom-built controller, a string instrument, and a pulley toy. We perform by combining pre-composed tracks with sounds sampled live during the performance.
