31st National Cultural Festival – Aichi 2016.
© Julius Njau all rights reserved
Welcome to the “31st National Cultural Festival – Aichi 2016.”
It is a great honor to host the National Cultural Festival in Aichi Prefecture, the “Kingdom of Manufacturing,” welcoming many performers and visitors from across the country. We sincerely and warmly welcome your visit to our prefecture.
The theme of this National Cultural Festival, “『Aigo Chishin』~ Cherish tradition with love, know the new, culture is in motion ~,” expresses the idea of re-examining the various cultures handed down in Aichi, fostering awareness of passing on local culture to future generations, and promoting the creation and development of new cultural expressions through exchange with other regions.
Under this theme, over a 36-day period, 90 projects will be carried out across all 54 municipalities in the prefecture, ranging from traditional cultures preserved in each region to new, locally unique cultural initiatives, thereby showcasing the rich and abundant culture of Aichi in its entirety.
Aichi has long developed its own unique cultures in various parts of the prefecture. It has also produced many warlords of the Sengoku period, including the three great unifiers—Oda Nobunaga, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, and Tokugawa Ieyasu—and in the Edo period, they and their descendants governed domains across Japan, making the region highly influential in the formation of early modern Japan.
At the opening ceremony and opening festival, these three great historical figures will serve as storytellers, and a stage performance will be presented that introduces the charm of Aichi’s unique culture, using “dashi” (traditional festival floats), one of its cultural symbols, as a motif.
Culture connects people, provides the foundation for mutual understanding and respect, and forms the basis of the society in which people live. We hope that all participants in the National Cultural Festival will fully demonstrate the results of their daily efforts, and through meaningful exchanges with many others, become a driving force for new cultural creation.
This year in Aichi, the “Aichi Triennale 2016” will be held starting in August, and following the National Cultural Festival, the “16th National Arts and Cultural Festival for People with Disabilities – Aichi” will take place in December. We hope visitors will experience the diverse culture and arts of our prefecture, from cutting-edge contemporary art to traditional culture and disability arts, and also take this opportunity to enjoy Aichi’s history, nature, and cuisine.
In closing, I would like to express my heartfelt gratitude to all those who have provided exceptional support and cooperation in the hosting of the National Cultural Festival in our prefecture, and conclude this address.