Photo: Masato Moriama at Trival- Hair&Makeup: Tadashi Harada at Shiseido - Text: Haruna Fujimura Editor: Mina Oba
Original source vogue.co.jp
Big thanks & Credits for JP/ENG
translation to @linhambabey / Janjan
Active as an artist on September 14, 2020 is MIYAVI the “Samurai
Guitarist”. He isn’t just active with music, MIYAVI was appointed as the first
Japanese ambassador to the UNHCR in 2017, working closely to
support refugees. We are wondering what the image of the future looks like
after all of the changes caused by the corona calamity for someone involved in
all these fields. He speaks about his personally feelings on the topic of
hope and also shares his private goals.
When I can’t look people in the eyes, I get nervous,
so I need the power from the message of music.
-- Are there things about you that have changed because of the Corona
pandemic?
A virus that we can’t even look in the eyes has changed the world so
dramatically in just half a year. So there are a lot of things within the industry that are revolutionizing and
adapting so we can continue heading toward the future.
But at the same time, as musicians we are just trying to believe in the power
of music. Because we can’t look at the virus itself, it’s
scary. But we also cannot look at music. In order to conquer that
fear and anxiety, I strongly feel we need the power of the message of music.
So, we need to keep staying up to date with the news and listen to the
safety messages in the safety of our own homes.
-- The stay at home orders were very hard to cope with, weren’t they.
As a creator, I just thought about what I am able to create right now. I
thought a lot about what could I do from my own home to share with the world
and realized I could use social media to spread performances. That was
the birth of the family concerts I was doing and the virtual lives I am doing
now. In April of this year, I released my new album “Holy Nights” but the directors of the
music video and a lot of the editing teams were based in LA so I used Zoom to
communicate from a distance with my creative team. It was a new
experience.
-- While the world was
completely changed by the Corona pandemic, how did you change your efforts to
respond to those changes?
Well, in August I had a
collaboration with TeamLab Planets Tokyo to evolve my virtual live
experience with “Miyavi Virtual LIVE - Level 3.0”. The TeamLab Planets
team put a lot of effort into making this more than just a regular live, it was
an art production that we succeeded in making together. Of course there
were challenges but I think we did create something worth leaving behind.
But, having done these virtual lives, virtual is just virtual with it’s own
good parts but, as an entertainer myself, the realness of a live is what I
excel at doing is the conclusion I have reached.
-- What exactly is the point
that you can’t surpass?
For example, the surplus of
news. In the case of a real live concert, I think about the temperature
at the concert all on the way there. I think about what I’m gonna eat or
drink while listening to music. Who did people come with? What do
they talk about with that person? All of those things swirl together and
form what I remember from the day of that concert. There is none of that
in the case of a virtual live because the fans all receive it just on their
device that they are also using to watch the news which can be overwhelming.
But
from now on, the coexistence of real and virtual lives are going to be
indispensable to us. There are still a lot of things I am looking for but
I am making an effort to connect with the fans however I can. Hardware
and software all need to be updated. We will continue to make mistakes
while we try new new platforms but we will take any hints to find the right
way.
When you feel
surprised, embrace people full of hope.
-- After filming the movie Unbroken in 2014, you met
Angelina Jolie and embraced working with refugees. Now, you are the first
friendship ambassador from Japan to the UNHCR. After starting to work with that organization, were there
any parts in yourself you feel have changed?
I
definitely feel like I got more recognition outside of music. When I
first went to Lebanon as an ambassador, I had worried thoughts like “this is
going to be hard” and “what if there is a terrorist attack since we are going
to an area with a lot of disputed territories”. But when I got there and
started playing the guitar in front of the ordinary children, it stopped being
something I’d never experienced when the children’s faces light up with
excitement. In that moment, all of my anxieties and fears just flew
away. “They are all embracing this moment’s feelings, feeling the hope
and the future” is what I felt from them. At the same time, I also
thought “The power to move people with music, even here, is amazing. If
I can, I’m going to use that power with all of my strength.”
-- The feeling of
hope can give people the motivation to keep living, right.
Refugee support
happens in two phases - Urgent and Continuation development. The Urgent
phase is when they need lifeline utilities. The Continuation phase is
when the feeling of “I am alive” becomes priority. I spoke to the
marathon runner Yonas Kinde, who is also a
refugee, once a while ago and he said something I will never forget:
“Earning enough money to afford to eat is great and all but even then, if you
don’t have someone to talk to, that’s still enough to make one cry”
-- What does the feeling “to live” mean to you?
For humans, the
feeling of “I am useful” is needed or we feel like our souls are
dying. When doing sports or listening to music or just any action
involved in participating with art and culture people feel “ah, I am
alive”. Culture and Art have an amazing effect on people. Once,
when I was at Kakuma Campin Turkana, Kenya, they were
holding a festival. Around 2 or 3 thousand children from that area
gathered, dancing and playing music. It was wonderful, watching them
perform in a way integral to their culture with such vigor. Everyone was
behaving like themselves, not trying to be anyone else, and being honest to
their souls. In Japan, I feel the topic of refugees is a heavy one, and
people are only shown pictures of refugees who are showing sad
expressions. I want to show them the smiling faces I see in the refugee
camps. “We make happy faces too” I think would surprise them.
-- The way you look at these camps and see the way they are all shining and
arrange music around that, and film music vidoes like your video for “The Others” at camps,
showing such diverse cultural expressions is inspirational.
One of the themes
in the song “The Others” is “we are all different”. For example, even
among the Japanese people, the food we eat for breakfast are different, our
favorite colors are different. The roads we are all following are
different. Even so, we all still create a perfect medley of life
together. I just arranged that to express it in real music. That
music video was actually filmed by Angie (Angelina Jolie), she did the directing
herself so it is something that holds a lot of memories for me.
Refugees support
needs to become “rock” in society today.
MIYAVI’s personal symbols of hope. On the left is a light blue
UNHCR hat and on the right is the medal MIYAVI
received from children in Colombia.
-- Today, MIYAVI,
you’ve brought some items that make you feel memories of hope. Could you
tell us what those memories are?
First is the medal
I received in 2019 in Colombia following my
appointment as Goodwill ambassador to the UNHCR. I gave a soccer ball to the kids
there as a present and we played soccer together. I was the one who
wanted to give the kids a medal but somehow they ended up giving me one
(LOL). Whenever I look at this medal, I vividly remember playing soccer
with these kids. It affirms the importance of sports and music for me.
-- Your other item of hope is a light
blue UNHCR hat.
In the past, I did
not think that a hat like this was rock. But now, I just think that
supporting refugees is super rock. I think the term role model is a bit
pretentious but if young kids see me wearing this hat and see the messaging and
start to believe in it, I started to think this hat that says I support
Refugees as being cool. I thought that there might be a way to change the
world, even just by a little bit.
Without
literacy, the fashion industry cannot survive in 10 years.
As a global campaign model of Gucci, Miyavi is seen here wearing a pink
suit.
-- You are the first global campaign model for Gucci from Japan so you
are also active in the fashion industry. From the point of view of the
fashion world, what do you think is an important goal for the world and society
to aim for?
I think the
consumption and sustainability in fashion have completely reversed in the
recent past. We start to working closely with the environment, from now
on, we need to focus more on literacy in order to consider success as an
option, or else we won’t exist in 10 years. From inside the trends, I
strongly feel the movement to present new things by questioning the fashion
industry itself. For example, the collection I participated in recently
“Gucci Off the Grid Collection” the creative director was Alessandro Michele
and the rest of the Gucci team really give off a feeling of wanting to create
sustainability. I think that there is a great meaning with a mainstream
brand like Gucci shifting the rudder like this.
-- There needs to be a change in the consciousness of designers, huh.
Not just the
designers but the people who make the material, the people who buy it, the
people who promote it, the society as a whole needs to change our way of
consumption and think about how we buy. I feel like I’m repeating myself
again but culture is a tough force of change. Because we live in the
world we have now, I think there is a special way that only fashion can show a
message of hope.
-- Lastly, how do
you think society as a whole is going to move forward, do you think?
We may have to
come back and think about “was the way we were all acting on a global scale the
right way in the first place?” In 10 years, we may look back and think
that “wow we really needed corona” in order for us to make the changes we need
to think about the future properly.
-- You don’t look at
coronavirus pessimistically, you look at it as a chance to make our own
future. I think that is important.
Well if we all
hold a big enough hope, we can make even small actions happen. These
actions can be sorting your trash, choosing to use recycled and reusable
products, so even small things are good, I think. I can’t save the
world like the Avengers. But I can help spread the message, so I will
continue my work hoping to share the hope that our world can be changed. And I will always carry that hope with me.
Photo: Masato Moriama at Trival
Hair&Makeup: Tadashi Harada at Shiseido
Text: Haruna Fujimura
Editor: Mina Oba
Original source vogue.co.jp
Big thanks & Credits for JP/ENG
translation to @linhambabey / Janjan
No comments:
Post a Comment