Crossovers and Rewrites:
BORDERS OVER ASIA
Chikako Yamashiro
Borders
Video, 9 mins, 2004
The artist records contemporary Okinawa with its political and cultural influences telling of a fragmented history.
The island was returned to Japan at the beginning of the 1970's in a handover that marked the end of a long period of annexation dating from World War II.
The shoreline scene at the end of the video shows a barbed wire linking concrete blocks on the beach, that separate an area scheduled for the construction site of a new American base.
The question of whether this base, planned to be built behind the boundary on the coral reefs near the coast,
will finally be realized, or whether it will be possible to stop the construction, will have a deep impact on the
future of the island.