Yesterday I attended an event on the internationalization of Noh at the National Noh Theatre in Tokyo. The event was organized by the Nohgaku Performers’ Association and featured an award ceremony for the three winners of the English composition contest. These were carefully selected out of 80+ submissions. They all stressed the need for a better understanding of Noh in order to appreciate it more. Two papers, in particular, focused on the need for multilingual surtitles and explanations as a way for the audience to appreciate performance through the understanding of the text. Does good art need explanations? Hard to give a single answer to this question… no, and yes. No, good art should be able to be at least partially appreciated for most of those who receive it. However, a greater appreciation of an artwork may (not must) depend on a deeper knowledge of its history, cultural context, techniques, etc. Does good art need explanations? The counter-question should be: who is the audience we are considering when asking the question? Greater appreciation of Noh will depend on the ability of its practitioners to understand their audiences better. As long as communication is one way (art producers instructing art consumers), we will see little improvement in the appreciation of noh. It would be a shame.

– Diego Pellecchia