Mimesis, Murakami and Multimedia Art: Parallel Worlds in Performance

Abstract

The artistic techniques of mimesis—the representation of reality in art—make it possible to “render the unreal familiar or the real strangely unfamiliar.” The author, a composer and intermedia artist, uses mimetic techniques in acoustic composition, video art and field recording to reimagine everyday experience, as in his multimedia piece Landscape: Home. The author analyzes passages from the novel Sputnik Sweetheart by Haruki Murakami to understand Murakami’s use of “parallel worlds” and the “reality effect.” This literary analysis aims to highlight the potential of mimetic techniques for artistic practice in sound and image, particularly in the author’s Landscape series.