72 Books & arts The Economist January 15th 2022
go; many in the local community ques
tioned the expense, Ms Kumakura remem
bers. But over time, attitudes changed.
Young volunteers established lasting ties
with local residents; many came to help
when a big earthquake hit the region in- Though some locals remain hostile
to using funds on incomprehensible
installations instead of roads or clinics,
many have come around. This year’s will
be the festival’s eighth edition.
For rural venues, the projects are an
alternative to the infrastructuredriven
regeneration initiatives the national gov
ernment favours. They have come to relish
their new status as tourist destinations: or
dinary villages now boast attractions from
worldrenowned names such as James
Turrell, an American light artist, and Mari
na Abramovic, a Serbian performance
artist. But for Mr Kitagawa, changing atti
tudes are the true dividend.
Young at art
With art as a catalyst, he says, the elderly
have grown “more energetic”, young peo
ple have begun to visit, and local adminis
trations have become “more global in
terms of their mindset”. One study of Echi
goTsumari found that some 60% of the
population had worked at or attended the
festival. Those who did were more trusting
of strangers, and had higher levels of both
social capital and life satisfaction than
those who did not.
For urban Japanese, the events seem to
give shape to an “unformed yearning” to
escape office life, reckons Justin Jesty of
the University of Washington: “They’re on
to something with respect to the direction
of people’s imaginations.” Government
surveys suggest nearly 40% of citydwell
ers aged between 18 and 29 would like to
live in a village; for many, the pandemic
seems to have heightened the appeal.
The ato purojekutocan feel sanitised.
Organisers must maintain close relation
ships with local governments, which tend
to be dominated by the ruling Liberal
Democratic Party, so there is rarely any
overt political critique. Critics say that robs
the art of its ability to shock and challenge
viewers. The installations tend towards the
abstract and visually pleasing—in contrast
to many big European and American art
jamborees, where, these days, politics has
to be “visible and explicit, you have to raise
your fist, to slap the face, metaphorically
speaking”, as Ms Tomii puts it.
Yet the projects are radical in their own
way. By bringing art into rural regions, they
pose political questions of a subtler but no
less essential sort—about whom art is for
and its role in an ageing society. At their
best, says Mr Favell, the ato purojekuto
highlight ways of coping witheconomic
and demographic stagnation, andofliving
in “the ruins of the Anthropocene”.nH
e showed theworldthatblack
actors could be Hollywood heroes. In
films such as “To Sir, With Love”, “Guess
Who’s Coming to Dinner” and “In the
Heat of the Night”, all released in 1967, Sir
Sidney Poitier was not a loyal sidekick or
a servant. He was a blisteringly hand
some, nuanced and charismatic leading
man. His talent, elegance and class made
him a superstar, and, in 1964, they made
him the first ever black actor to win an
Academy Award for a leading role, in
“Lilies of the Field”.
Many in the film industry and beyond
revered him as a trailblazer who refused
to play any part that might reflect badly
on black people. A few critics called him
bland and ingratiating. In the New York
Timesin 1967 Clifford Mason defined his
benign onscreen persona as “a good guy
in a totally white world...helping the
white man solve the white man’s pro
blem”. But no one could mistake the
determination and skill it took for Sir
Sidney, who died last week at the age of
94, to become Hollywood’s exemplar of
AfricanAmerican dignity.
Born in 1927, he was the seventh child
of farmers who grew tomatoes in the
Bahamas. At 15 his parents sent him to
live in Miami; the following year he
moved to New York, where he worked on
his diction by listening to radio an
nouncers, and improved his literacy by
poring over newspapers with a kind
Jewish waiter at the restaurant where he
washed dishes. He joined the AmericanNegroTheatre,andbythetime he was
cast in his first film, “No Way Out” (1950),
he was as authoritative as any actor of
any background, with a fiery glare, an
imposing physical presence, exquisite
poise and a penetrating voice. It was hard
for any viewer to look away from him, or
down on him.
Most of his films tackled racism. In
the 1950s they included “Cry, the Beloved
Country”, the filming of which let him
see South African apartheid firsthand
(he later played Nelson Mandela in a
madefortelevision biopic); “Blackboard
Jungle”, a seminal rock ’n’ roll high
school drama; and “Porgy and Bess”, Otto
Preminger’s film of George Gershwin’s
musical. In “The Defiant Ones”, his
chaingang fugitive was manacled to a
southern bigot played by Tony Curtis.
Both were nominated for Oscars.
Still, the criticisms hurt. Tired of
being a figurehead, Sir Sidney switched
to lighter comic roles in the 1970s and
directed several raucous comedies; “Stir
Crazy” (1980) was his biggest hit. Knight
ed in 1974, he took a decadelong break
from acting in his 50s, returning to the
screen all too rarely afterwards. But he
had already achieved as much as anyone
in Hollywood history. It wasn’t until
2002 that a second black star, Denzel
Washington, received an Oscar for his
performance in a leading role. On the
same evening, Mr Washington presented
Sir Sidney with an honorary award for his
extraordinary life’s work. HollywoodlegendsThe defiant one
Sidney Poitier was a trailblazing hero of cinemaThrough the heat of the night