EDANI Hiroko

Landscape scholar and Section Chief of the Cultural Landscape Section at the Nara National Research Institute for Cultural Properties, National Institutes for Cultural Heritage. Her field of expertise is landscape architecture. She has conducted research on cultural landscapes throughout Japan, from urban and rural areas to mountain and coastal communities, exploring the characteristics of landscapes and how they can be sustained, based on the natural conditions of the land, and ways of life in the past and the present. She has received the Zoen (Landscape Architecture) Grand Award from Tokyo University of Agriculture, the Tamura Tsuyoshi Award from the Japanese Institute of Landscape Architecture, and the Japan ICOMOS Encouragement Award.

ITO Misa

Cutout “kirie” and shadow theatre artist, painter and illustrator based in Tokushima. Besides exhibiting her work, she creates cover art and illustrations for books, as well as stencils for “katazome” (Japanese stencil dyeing). She also exhibits installations incorporating kirie and creates and performs shadow plays. Her original works include Mawaru Ohanashi (Circulating Stories), a series exploring the cycles of life and time. Her work is highly regarded for its powerful yet delicate nature.

NAGAI Yoshiko

Curator, producer, and founder of the curatorial production label Materia Prima. Through fieldwork exploring the origins of materials and cultures, she weaves narratives that convey the cultural values nurtured within each “fūdo” or distinct locale and society, working across planning, production and writing. She planned and produced the project Water Calling, exploring Kyoto’s groundwater, and contributed editorial support to Savoir & Faire: La Terre and Savoir & Faire: Le Métal, edited by the Fondation d’entreprise Hermès and published by Iwanami Shoten, Publishers. She is also involved as an art director in the initiatives of the Cultural Landscape Section at the Nara National Research Institute for Cultural Properties.