LISTEN developed following Makihara’s discovery of sign language poetry, and her meeting with butoh dancer Dakei. Growing up without hearing aids, using only vibrations and vision, Dakei had always believed that he could never make music. But as he continued to dance and sign, he developed a hybrid language that transcended conventional theories of resonance. Together, the pair proposed to explore the boundaries of a “music of the deaf” through cinema. Casting both internationally active dancers and deaf people without any performing experience, they pursued a visuality and feeling of music as something like ki – overflowing from the soul.

Eri Makihara‘s work is based on experimental film and installation, and is created from the perspective of the biological body senses of people, primarily visual and sign language.

Her works takes different forms, such as screenings and performances, but the underlying concept is the “eloquence” of the human body and space, and the invisible oppression that exists behind it. By providing devices to visualise the phenomena produced by these works, Makihara continues to explore our commonalities and differences, and to attempt to bring to light the social structure of this world. Makihara co-directed the art documentary film LISTEN (2016) with DAKEI on the theme of Deaf people’s “music,” and The Tanaka Family (2021), they are producing a new commission for the Yebisu International Festival 2025.

Three Times (2025), Dream of My Mother (2023), The Tanaka Family (2021), LISTEN (2016)