CHIHARU SHIOTA: THE SOUL TREMBLES
Until 19 March 2025, the Grand Palais, as a preview of the reopening of all its galleries in June 2025, is presenting THE SOUL TREMBLES, an exhibition curated by Mami Kataoka – director of Mori Art Museum, Tokyo – and dedicated to the poetic and sensitive work of Japanese artist Chiharu Shiota.
Born in Osaka, Japan in 1972, Chiharu Shiota lives and works in Berlin. She combines performance, body art and installations in a process centred on the body. Shiota has been exhibited around the world, including at Nakanoshima Museum of Art, Osaka, Japan (2024), Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, USA (2023), the P.S.1 Contemporary Art Centre, New York (2003), K21 Kunstsammlung NRW, Düsseldorf (2014) and the Smithsonian, Washington DC (2014). In 2015, Shiota represented Japan at the Venice Biennale.
Since the mid-90s, the artist has produced installations of interlacing wool yarn, creating spectacular graphic networks through which the visitor must find their way and their place. These giant canvases often envelop objects from her everyday life (chairs, beds, pianos, clothes, etc.) and invite the viewer on a majestic, dreamlike journey. Though famous for her entangled pieces, the artist’s practice also extends to sculpture, photography, video and drawing, and a body of this work will be presented in the exhibition. Her protean creations explore the notions of temporality, movement and dreams, demanding a dual engagement from the viewer, both mental and physical.
The exhibition, co-organised with the Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, is the largest ever devoted to the artist in France, spanning more than 20 years of her career. It will offer visitors a sensitive experience through several monumental installations spread over more than 1,200 square metres. Having experienced the fragility of the life she has been granted, directly and on multiple occasions, Shiota hopes that this exhibition will be able to transmit the tremors of her own soul to others, with her entire body.
With seven large-scale installations, sculptures, photographs, drawings, performance videos and archive documents related to its staging project, the exhibition represents an opportunity for visitors to familiarise themselves with Shiota’s career, which spans over twenty years.
