I was reminded of Hachiko, the Akita dog in Japan who loyally waited for the return of his owner at a train station until he died. In 1924, Hachikō was brought to Tokyo by his owner, Hidesaburō Ueno, a professor in the agriculture department at the University of Tokyo. During his owner's life Hachikō saw him out from the front door and greeted him at the end of the day at the nearby Shibuya Station. The pair continued their daily routine until May 1925, when Professor Ueno did not return on the usual train one evening. The professor had suffered from a cerebral hemorrhage at the university that day. He died and never returned to the train station where his friend was waiting. Hachikō was loyal and every day for the next nine years he waited sitting there amongst the town's folk.
I thought there was another (perhaps Greek?) proverb or story that went along with this idea as well, but it escapes me at the moment.
I made You Remember Dada because I became my interest in the archive and preservation and documentation of time continues to interest me. In addition, the idea value as a human being adds another layer. A third layer is the projection of value.
"See how much I am loved/liked/cared for/admired/ect?"
This manifests itself in the form of status updates on Facebook, self important blog posts, thousands of photos of people with their friends which convey a sense of popularity and importance they could never achieve on their own. I chose to make You Remember Dada because, in THIS particular piece, I wanted to show what I think to be is true love and loyalty that does not know the bounds of the conditional. What better place to go than to animals for that? Perhaps I will address (to me) superficial love as well. Who knows.
As I researched this, I found that a movie was being made about Hachiko.
This is a still of You Remember Dada and Hachiko.
