Japanese artist Sunayama Norico’s A Sultry World is a thought-provoking piece first shown in 1995 at the Art Tower Mito in Japan. The piece has now made its way to Art Central Hong Kong, an event set during the 2024 Hong Kong Art Week to showcase innovative galleries and their distinguished artists who create think pieces. A Sultry World is a performance piece where a single woman performer (who used to be Sunayama herself) wears a red dress with a towering skirt. She would proceed to dare visitors to look under her skirt, as if asking them to up-skirt her.
At first glance, it seems like the piece is inviting audiences to commit sexual assault. However, the artist wishes to remind viewers that, unlike sexual assault, all parties involved in A Sultry World, especially its performer, have consented to the seemingly lewd act. The performance is also done in a public place with security measures in place to ensure everyone’s safety. Once inside the performer’s skirt, viewers will find a calming space to rest and relax. This space has been scented with lavender and equipped with coloured pens and sketchbooks to create a space of solitude, rest and relaxation.
Here, A Sultry World is an invitation extended by the artist to encourage people not to fear sex as a topic, as symbolized by the performer’s skirt. Sunayama wishes that people would instead take a positive approach to sex and not consider it taboo. To think of it instead as a space that is warm and welcoming, worthy of future research and understanding, which can go a long way in terms of increasing people’s literacy of their sexual health. This reflects the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal of Reduced Inequalities and Good Health And Well-Being.
A report on the sexual and reproductive health of young people in Asia and the Pacific that was compiled by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) found that most young people in the region have insufficient access to proper comprehensive sexuality education (CSE). This means that they do not have the life skills to create an environment which fosters safe and consensual sexual relationships. This has resulted in up to 3.7 million unintended adolescent pregnancies in the region annually, which in turn contributes to a significant amount of underreported unsafe abortion practices. This reality shows just how important an open and welcoming attitude to sexual education is, the core message of Sunayama’s A Sultry World.
A Sultry World by Sunayama Norico challenges societal taboos surrounding sexuality through a rather strange method that invites viewers to go under a woman’s skirt. Despite the initial shock value of the piece, it was created to remind its audiences of just how important it is to keep an open mind when approaching the topic of sex and sex education. The cozy room that Sunayama has created under her performer’s skirt further allows people to ease into the matter at hand, hopefully opening up their minds to the topic, especially when talking about it to younger audiences.
Find out more about A Sultry World by Sunayama Norico and other pieces at Art Central Hong Kong by checking their website www.artcentralhongkong.com or Instagram @artcentralhk.