KOJIKI DE CREATION to Make World Premiere at Japan Society

Japan Society will present the world premiere of Kojiki de Creation, a whimsical multimedia puppet theater work by NYC-based performer and visual artist Maiko Kikuchi drawn from Japan's oldest chronicle of origin myths and ancient history, the Kojiki. This performance arrives as part of Japan Society's Fall 2026 TWO SOILS Series marking the 250th Anniversary of the United States, with four programs that harvest the origin stories, living myths and traditions of both Japan and the U.S. while examining what it means to be a nation. Kojiki de Creation will have four performances only, taking place Thursday, October 15 – Sunday, October 18 at Japan Society (333 East 47th Street).

Performance runs approximately 70 minutes. Recommended for ages 8+. A pre-performance lecture on Japanese mythology by Columbia University Professor David Lurie begins one hour prior to the start of the 7:30pm performances on Friday, October 16 and Saturday, October 17; and a post-show Q&A with the artists follows the 2:30pm performance on Sunday, October 18 (all free and open to ticketholders).

In Maiko Kikuchi's latest work of puppet theater, Kojiki de Creation animates the mischievous Shinto gods, fantastical beasts and charming creatures of Japanese mythology, threading together an enchanting series of connected vignettes from the astonishing tales of the Kojiki (set to writing in 712 CE), a collection of myths detailing Japan's celestial origins. Rather than offering a literal retelling, this work creates a layered storytelling experience blending myth and contemporary expression. As a lone reader opens the Kojiki and begins to read, four puppeteers bring her imagination to life, acting out these primordial stories on stage as filtered through the reader's fantasies. Collaging together puppetry, narration, sculpture, masks, animation, music and live-feed video into a multimedia spectacle, Kikuchi carries the audience from the first stirrings of chaos through the parting of heaven and earth, a harrowing descent into the land of the dead and the sun goddess's retreat into the cave that plunges the world into darkness.

The puppets of Kojiki de Creation are each assembled onstage out of familiar, ordinary objects – such as plates, wooden spoons, paper cups, lights and an electric fan – and combined with intricately constructed forms composed of cardboard or papier-mâché to create a unique and enchanting pantheon of gods and creatures. This approach is shaped by the Japanese Shinto concept of yaoyorozu no kami, the belief that countless spirits dwell in all things, which rests at the heart of the Kojiki itself. This approach to puppetry becomes a way of revealing the latent life within objects. The puppets do not arrive as separate finished characters; they emerge directly out of familiar materials, allowing the audience to witness the passage from object to living being in real time. A live camera frames the reader's imagined world as a completed image, while the space outside the frame keeps the creative construction visible. 'For me,' says Maiko Kikuchi, 'the moment an everyday object is transformed, perceived and animated into a living presence is one of the essential powers of puppet theater.'

Kojiki de Creation is performed by Maiko Kikuchi, Marty Allen, Amanda Card, Pepper Fajans, Jamie Feidner and Jeremy Kadetsky.

Commissioned by Japan Society, Kojiki de Creation was developed during Kikuchi's nine-month residency at the NowHere Studio Program in DUMBO, Brooklyn, where the work took shape across a series of open studios and work-in-progress showings, including presentations during DUMBO Open Studios and Art in DUMBO's First Thursday gallery walks.

Maiko Kikuchi is a Tokyo-born, New York City-based multidisciplinary artist working across illustration, painting, drawing, collage, sculpture, animation, puppetry and performance. With the 'daydream' — the state between reality and the surreal — as her central theme, she builds surreal, handcrafted worlds shaped by memory, subconscious imagery and poetic abstraction. Her interest in the boundary between dreams and reality traces to her father, a psychoanalyst, in whose office she first encountered the miniature landscapes of sandplay therapy. Kikuchi received her B.A. from Musashino Art University in Tokyo in 2008 and her M.F.A. in Sculpture from Pratt Institute in 2012. Her puppet and performance works, which she writes, directs and performs herself, have been presented at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Public Theater, La MaMa Experimental Theatre, St. Ann's Warehouse, HERE and Dixon Place. She previously appeared at Japan Society with PINK BUNNY (2016) and 9000 Paper Balloons (2022), the latter created with Spencer Lott and directed by Aya Ogawa. In 2025 she was a guest artist at the National Puppetry Conference at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center, and she is a curator of the Object Movement Puppetry Residency and a board member of the Puppetry Guild of Greater New York.

TICKETS & INFORMATION

• Thursday, October 15 at 7:30pm — Followed by a Private Gathering for Artists and Members
• Friday, October 16 at 7:30pm — Preceded by a 6:30pm Pre-Performance Lecture
• Saturday, October 17 at 7:30pm — Preceded by a 6:30pm Pre-Performance Lecture
• Sunday, October 18 at 2:30pm — Followed by an Artist Q&A

Tickets are $43 / $32 Japan Society members.

Ticketholders will also receive complimentary, same-day admission for one person to Gen'ichirō Inokuma's NYC Salon, on view at Japan Society Gallery from October 6, 2026 through January 10, 2027. To view the exhibition please show ticket/receipt to the Welcome Desk for free admission before the performance.

Tickets can be purchased online at https://japansociety.org/events/hiroaki-umeda-assimilating-and-moving-state-1/ or by calling the Box Office at 212-715-1258 or in person at Japan Society (M-F 9:00am – 5:00pm). Japan Society is located at 333 East 47th Street, between First and Second Avenues (accessible by the 4/5/6 at 42nd Street-Grand Central Station or the E at Lexington Avenue and 53rd Street). For more information, call 212-832-1155 or visit https://www.japansociety.org/

This season's TWO SOILS Series delivers a compelling roster of new productions and premieres timed with the historic 250th Anniversary milestone year of the United States, harvesting the origin stories, living myths and traditions of both Japan and the U.S., while embracing Japan Society's unique position as an institution deeply connected to two nations. Yoko Shioya, Artistic Director at Japan Society, remarks, 'Given Japan Society's special identity as an authority on Japan while, in fact, also being an American institution founded in the U.S., we have programmed our Fall Performing Arts Season around a 'Nation' series, digging into the national stories of Japan and the United States in our way while showcasing the work of these groundbreaking artists.'

The Series kicks off in September with Rooted: Akiko Yano — Japanese and American Folk (September 18), featuring pianist, singer-songwriter and musical icon Akiko Yano performing fresh takes on Japanese and American folk music alongside two extraordinary collaborators — Tsugaru shamisen virtuoso Hiromitsu Agatsuma and, in a first-ever musical meeting, American folk luminary Sam Amidon. Following the world premiere of Kojiki de Creation, the series continues with The Age is Yours, My Liege! A Tale of Proto-Japan (November 6 & 7), a North American premiere from choreographic provocateur Reisa Shimojima and her dance company KEDAGORO that stitches together sacred rite, wartime fervor, primeval festival culture and fantastic physical feats into an ecstatic and biting critique of Japanese national identity and imperial myth. Concluding the Series, in White Stones (December 11), musician Kaoru Watanabe and composer / performance artist Kite (Suzanne Kite) draw on Noh theater and Lakȟóta ceremonial practice to ask what it means to seek ancestral guidance in a country built on forgetting, interweaving a soundscape of traditional instruments and electronics while Kite's ground-breaking sovereign AI program, self-built entirely from ancestral stories, shapes what unfolds in real time.

In Winter/Spring 2027, Japan Society presents, as part of the 2027 Under the Radar Festival, the long-awaited North American premiere of Yoroboshi (January 14 – 16), a ruthless work of puppet theater by Japanese auteur Satoko Ichihara, which refashions the centuries-old Japanese legend of a blind boy abandoned by his father into an outrageous tale of desire, illness and violence as embodied by a mannequin, a traffic dummy and a sex doll (for audiences ages 18+). Next up, Japan Society presents the 21st Contemporary Dance Festival: Japan + East Asia (February 26 – 27), featuring works from Japan, Taiwan and South Korea that represent the latest cutting-edge contemporary dance coming out of East Asia today. Following this, Japan Society presents Meet Kabuki — The Art of the Onnagata (March 12 – 13), a rare backstage glimpse of a 400-year-old tradition: the art of transforming a male body into a vision of ideal femininity as perfected by kabuki's onnagata actors, those who undergo years of rigorous training to master female roles. The season continues with the 21st Installment of Japan Society's Annual Play Reading Series, presenting the play Banquet for a Void (April 5), a fourth-wall-breaking script set amidst the gaudy halls of taishu engeki (Japan's sentimental popular theater), written by award-winning former Takarazuka director Kumiko Ueda and helmed by NYC-based director Seonjae Kim. The season culminates with another anniversary milestone: Japan Society's 120th birthday festivities in May 2027, crowned by the momentous return of Mansaku-no-Kai Kyogen Company (May 13 – 15), stewards of a 600-year old comic art form and the Society's most illustrious performing arts partners across seven decades. Living National Treasure Mansaku Nomura and film and television superstar Mansai Nomura lead a noteworthy cast of kyogen actors, while visual artist Hiroshi Sugimoto, a celebrated long-time collaborator of the Nomura family, designs a stunning stage backdrop.