Omotesando is not my favorite place in Tokyo — too much emphasis on shopping and international luxury brands. And I certainly never had reason to enter the Louis Vuitton store there until today, when I was lured in by word of an impressive art installation. I hadn’t realized the building houses an impressive art space called Espace.
I went with my family to check out a sculpture by Brazilian artist Ernesto Neto. Called “Life is a body we are part of,” it’s a giant suspended macrame of polypropylene string and plastic balls that evokes pretty much every body part involved in procreation.
You can actually climb into it — after taking off your shoes, of course– and make your way through a catwalk that feels like nothing so much as a birth canal.
If you want, you can spend your allotted time (we got ten minutes) sitting pretty in the womb-like chamber at the top. The view out those 8-meter high windows over the rooftops of Omotesando is terrific.
Through January 6. Noon to 6 pm on Dec. 31; closed New Year’s Day. Otherwise open noon to 8 pm. Seventh floor of the Louis Vuitton Omotesando Bldg. 5-7-5 Jingumae, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo 150-0001. Tel 03-5766-109
Alice Gordenker アリス・ゴーデンカー 