- I Am the Art NOBUO KUBOTA
- Canada2025
- Annette Mangaard
- 85 DCP
- NR
Screening Dates
At 92, Governor General’s Award-winning artist Nobuo Kubota isn’t retiring—he’s reinventing himself. His newest obsession? Performance art. I Am the Art NOBUO KUBOTA is a bold, intimate portrait of a Japanese Canadian trailblazer whose creativity has never stopped evolving. From early sculpture to sound poetry, avant-garde jazz, and now live performance, Kubota has spent a lifetime breaking rules and fusing East and West, silence and sound, memory and experiment. But this is also a love story. While Kubota pushes his body and voice into uncharted territory, he is also caring for his 96-year-old wife Lee, who lives with advanced Alzheimer’s. Rare archival footage of his work with the Canadian Creative Music Collective (CCMC) and the Artists’ Jazz Band, along with haunting images from WWII internment camps, show how resilience and imagination shaped his life and art. Kubota proves that art is not something you make—it’s something you live.
Kubota passed away September 30, 2025, after viewing and approving of the film.
Post-screening conversation with director Annette Mangaard, moderated by Japanese Canadian artist Cindy Mochizuki.
