Over the last three years, Artist Initiative CommandN has coordinated and run a series of exhibitions: KANDADA/Project Collective, introducing a variety of art projects from Japan and overseas, with an objective to actively research the possibilities of interaction between contemporary art and local society. In 2008 this activity developed into a broader research project on artist-driven, independent art projects within Asia.

Chosen from amongst a number of organizations visited in this Asian research project, Richard Streitmatter-Tran from Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, has been invited to KANDADA as a guest artist. He will present his work for the first time in Japan, and also appear as a panelist in an associated symposium. Having spent his early years in the USA, Richard is able to observe objectively the contemporary art scene in Vietnam and the states of the Mekong subregion. His activities can be said to be firmly rooted in his unique position as someone with one foot in the West and one in the East, and in his experience of living in both contrasting social regimes.

On research trips, members of CommandN have visited Thailand, Vietnam, Singapore and other countries to interview artists and organizations actively involved in alternative art activities in each region, and to view their facilities. Footage of these interviews will be screened and documentation, in the form of a mini reference library, will be displayed for a limited period during the exhibition. CommandN would like to introduce the activities of the groups they have met as examples of the possibilities they offer to those seeking alternatives to the existing art establishment and its framework.

Richard will present works produced and completed during his residency at Kandada in the exhibition, as well as a presentation of his continuing project, The Jungle Book.