“LYMENA” is an interactive video installation using a game engine, composed of an “inaccessible cave” inhabited by over a hundred bats and the meditative flow of time that permeates the forest surrounding the cave.

From her experience of helping Japanese pipistrelle bats return to the wild, HAYAMA has long held a special fascination for this animal. She considers bats as beings that inhabit a sensory world different from that of humans, which informs us of another world.

In this work, 3D computer graphics are used as a substitute for the natural world, a world that cannot be altered by humans. And the purpose-driven nature such as conquest and achievement found in traditional games is removed.

The landscape is rendered in real-time and displayed in the exhibition room (specially modified for this exhibition, the work will be displayed on the ICC’s permanent three-sided screen). The entrance to the cave in the center is sealed, making entry impossible. As the work begins, a single bat flies out of the cave and continues flying somewhere through the world thereafter. The viewer may be able to find it by carefully searching the forest with eyes and ears open.

There is a console in the hallway behind the exhibition room that viewers can use to explore the space. Its screen is also projected in the exhibition room and is shared with other viewers. When no one is operating it, the views from multiple fixed cameras located throughout the world will be displayed.

The space of “LYMENA” emerges as a structure with an unreachable center. Instead, by remaining on this side of the boundary of the “inaccessible cave,” the possibility of a different relationship will be unlocked.