Judo at UBS Openings, Tate Modern

As part of UBS Openings at The Long Weekend 2009: Do it yourself, a four-day Bank Holiday festival of performances, films, and music, The House of Fairy Tales presents Judo at Tate Modern on Saturday 23rd May and Sunday 24th May 2009, 12 - 6pm

The Everyday Press, in association with the British Judo Association and The Budokwai, presents the Judo Académie de Paris, technical director Yves Klein, Kodokan 4th dan black belt, as part of The House of Fairy Tales.

In 1954 the young artist Yves Klein returned from two years studying judo in Japan and opened his own grand judo club in Paris. On Saturday 23rd and Sunday 24th May art and judo will once more come together at Tate Modern.
In a giant marquee by the riverside on the North side of Tate Modern there will be a full sized judo mat where for two days anyone can experience the martial art and Olympic sport that was Yves Klein’s first love and inspiration.
The British Judo Association and The Budokwai (Europe’s oldest judo club, where Klein trained when in London) will be running demonstrations of kata and randori, contest judo, open sessions for children and adults, master classes led by Olympic silver medallist Ray Stevens and World Masters medallist Danny Murphy and trial sessions for anyone who would like to join in.

Yves Klein's book The Foundations of Judo, translated by artist Ian Whittlesea and published by The Everyday Press, will be available in the Tate bookshop.

The House of Fairy Tales is a non profit production company, set up in 2007 by artists Gavin Turk and Deborah Curtis to produce large and small scale, national and local events celebrating and promoting creative education. They work with an expanding network of visual artists, theatre performers, musicians, as well as creative mathematicians, inventors, engineers and scientists to help equip the next generation with the imagination needed for their future on the planet. They work in public spaces and in partnership with other institutions in order to reach a wide range of groups, cultures and abilities.