In a dark room, 24 iPhones and iPads glimmer like small windows, arranged on the walls as they would in a photography exhibition. Sounds quietly emanate from each device, growing distinct only as one approaches each of them.

The moving images on-screen depict Sakamoto’s home studio, living room, and garden in New York—places where the artist spent much of his time while working on async, his first album in eight years. The fragmented videos join corresponding environmental field recordings and a mix of stems from the album, culminating in this installation piece.
async–volume is the work of Zakkubalan (artist duo Neo Sora and Albert Tholen), whose primary focus has been producing film works. When asked to create a “behind-the-scenes” visual work exploring Sakamoto’s creative process, Zakkubalan eschewed conventional documentary style, opting instead to capture the landscapes that surround Sakamoto and the various traces and evocations of him. They attempted to draw a portrait that would make the presence of the artist felt without showing the artist himself.

The small screens draw the viewer close, so they are unable to see all of the images at once and can only peek into each window separately. As the viewer moves towards a window, the sound from that device grows more prominent, pushing away the other elements in the soundscape. As a person moves through the room, their path creates a unique mixture within the soundscape—a personal, individual experience for each viewer.
Enveloped in the womb-like embrace of sound and darkness, the viewer glimpses Sakamoto’s inner life from the inside-out through the many windows that open up into their own small worlds.