Contemporary Artist Tomokazu Matsuyama to Exhibit Latest Video Work 'Morning Again' in NY's Times Square from April 1st

Contemporary artist Tomokazu Matsuyama, based in New York, will begin screening his latest video work, 'Morning Again,' for one month starting April 1, 2026, as part of 'Times Square Arts’ Midnight Moment,' one of the world's largest digital public art programs held in Times Square, New York. In this program, from 11:57 PM to midnight every night, for three minutes, over 96 giant LED screens located from 41st to 49th Street will synchronize to display Matsuyama's video work. This creates an experience where the city's pulse and art merge during the 180 seconds when advertising lights are extinguished. 'Midnight Moment' is a public art project launched by Times Square Arts in 2012, transforming New York's iconic space into a canvas. Past participants include world-renowned artists such as David Hockney and Olafur Eliasson. This program, said to be seen by approximately 2.5 million people annually, creates invaluable moments on a global stage where eyes from around the world intersect. 'Morning Again' is a video work that abstractly visualizes the diverse cultural 'forces' flowing into New York as a microcosm of modern society, based on the concept of 'Four Pillars' (Four Freedoms). It demonstrates the 'freedom' inherent in the city of New York, where the 'actions' of thoughts, emotions, and values etched into the city intersect and overlap as light, movement, color, and form. The work features individuals embodying New York's diversity, including real people residing in New York who are also Matsuyama's friends. They serve as muses and symbolic presences resonating with contemporary society. As embodiments of the city's memory, culture, and time, they place themselves within an abstract flow, interacting with light and form to highlight the city's multilayered nature and dynamism. The intersection of the four freedoms—Prayer (freedom of mind), Pulse (freedom of the city), Self-Expression (freedom of self), and Transformation (freedom of gender/sexuality)—depicts the 'overlap' and 'generation' inherent in New York, the continuous process by which freedom is born, and expresses the portrait of the city itself. Steel and fixed-point movie materials for 'Morning Again' can be viewed at: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1tsZGk4i13OTnNWpw4BXF8o84U_NTF-W3?usp=sharing Artist Statement: 'Morning Again' is a video work that depicts the invisible forces shaping contemporary New York. Rather than portraying specific individuals, it illuminates the energy that keeps the city moving through four elements: hope, rhythm, self-expression, and transformation. What appears in the work is not a portrait of anyone. The layers of thoughts, values, and emotions accumulated in this city emerge as light, movement, color, and fluctuating forms, visualizing the very nature and essence of the city. The stage is Times Square, where the pulse of New York gathers. On giant LED screens as a canvas, the city's appearance, where history overlaps and diverse identities coexist without hierarchy, is depicted through light and movement. Rising light, spreading colors, and fluctuating forms convey the rhythm flowing within the city, drawing viewers into that space. Viewers pause, projecting themselves onto the unfolding images, and perceive the constantly changing movements of the city. Light extending towards hope, vibrations carrying the city's pulse, colors and movements affirming existence, and identities continually changing their contours—these intersect, merge, and reassemble, bringing forth the shared energy unique to New York, which has embraced a history of immigration and diverse cultures.