A Video by Can Tamura
Color – FHD – 11 min
In January 2018, while attending classes in visual anthropology in Münster, Germany, my family in Kanazawa, Japan experienced a snow storm that kept them stuck at home for several days. Because I couldn’t shovel snow for them, I made this video instead.
Director Biography – Can Tamura
Born in Dover, Delaware, USA in 1970.
Lives and works in Kanazawa, Japan.
Can Tamura is an artist, filmmaker, and audio-visual anthropologist. From 1988 to 1993 he attended Antioch College, the alma mater of anthropologist Clifford Geertz and television producer Rod Serling, where he studied painting with Gary Bower and film with Zeinabu irene Davis. In 1993 he moved to Kyoto, Japan, and from 2006 to 2014 worked as an assistant to artist Daniel Kelly. In 2012 he moved with his family to Kanazawa, Japan. He is currently a graduate student of visual anthropology, media and documentary practices at the University of Münster, and a filmmaker at the 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa.
His work in painting and photography has been shown in numerous solo and group exhibitions in Japan and Mongolia, and his video works made with Danish artists group Superflex have been exhibited in the 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa. His paintings, prints, and photographs are in private and public collections in Japan, Mongolia, and the USA.
Director Statement
This is part one of a two-part series of “slow snow movies,” the second being “Shoveler.” This film is a media-anthropological auto-ethnographic look at geographic separation – my family stays in Kanazawa, Japan while I sometimes take intensive courses in a graduate program in Münster, Germany. While my family is buried in snow unable to leave the house for several days, I reflect on being buried in the costs of a degree in visual anthropology. This is an experiment with the juxtaposition of text and narration with sounds and images that aim to evoke the experience of living in Münster.
