環香 wacca project

EVENT

TITLE
[Ruins Listening]
Exhibition/Experience
ARTIST
Maxime Matias
Graphic designer and Visual artist
Date
June 9 (Mon) – June 16 (Mon), 2025

CONCEPT

Ruins Listening

Maxime Matias believes that many of the most valuable things in life are invisible. In 2016, he encountered the Japanese incense ceremony kōdō for the first time through a book by the French philosopher Chantal Jaquet. Since then, he has deepened his interest in and understanding of this unique Japanese ritual culture. In kōdō, the word “smell” is not used; instead, the term “listen” is employed. He explains that this is not merely about sensing a fragrance, but about engaging deeply with the memories and thoughts it evokes in that moment.
This exhibition centers around the theme of "preserving the memory of vanishing places through scent." It focuses on five traditional machiyas in central Japan that were demolished in the summer of 2024. The project aims to document their final moments, collect traces of past lives from the rubble, and reconstruct those memories and emotions in a poetic and fragmented form.
The works displayed in front of the window are “suiseki (*).” Each is presented as a poetic object evoking the memory or imagined landscapes of the machiyas. They are composed of minerals (stones) paired with hand-carved wooden bases. Maxime selected evocative fragments of stone from the demolition sites and, using techniques learned from Noh mask masters and lacquer artisans, carved and lacquered the bases to create these suiseki himself.

INFORMATION

Exhibition:Ruins Listening


[Dates]June 9 (Mon) – June 16 (Mon), 2025
[Time]10:00-17:00
[Location]ei-to MAP
[Admission Fee]Free

Experience

As part of the exploration that forms the exhibition "Ruins Listening," we will hold an event where participants can experience the series of olfactory performances. This event involves burning traces (wood) collected from five machiyas by Maxime Matias, allowing participants to have an inner dialogue with the lives once lived in these old houses. The performance takes place both in Ei-to and Hokke-ji Temple within walking distance.

[Dates]June 10 (Tue)
[Time]2:30pm to 4:30pm
[Location]Hokke-ji Temple MAP
Reservations:Please click "Reservations" below and submit your name, number of people. The event will proceed rain or shine. Reservations
ARTIST

Maxime Matias

Graphic designer and Visual artist
France-based graphic designer and visual artist. After graduation from the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, he founded the independent design studio Rimasùu. After a residency at Les Ateliers de Paris, he has actively collaborated with architects, designers, and artisans, blending typography, photography, printing techniques, and olfactory art to create interdisciplinary graphic works.
Having studied kōdō (the Japanese art of incense appreciation) for several years, he was selected as an artist-in-residence at Villa Kujoyama in Kyoto in 2023. His project explored the traces of time left in abandoned machiya townhouses in Kyoto—fading memories, elusive scents, and the challenge of representing the intangible. This research led to a deep investigation of visual representation techniques, unique graphic formats, and synesthetic experiments.
WEB
https://www.rimasuu.com/
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