Science and art come together to bring Japanese lore to life at Vancouver festival

A special presentation aims to bring an ancient Japanese legend about two star-crossed lovers to life by combining science and folklore this B.C. Day long weekend. 

The Tanabata Star Festival Show is coming to the HR MacMillan Space Centre on Aug. 4 from 7 p.m to 9:30 p.m and also to the Powell Street Festival this Saturday from noon to 2 p.m.

Vancouver-based artist and educator, Raymond Nakamura, who also writes for the Science World British Columbia and Science Borealis, will showcase his illustrations depicting the famous story. 

"The illustrations are sort of cartoony with bright colours and I was trying to capture the folky aspect of it," he said.

"The interesting thing about Tanabata is that the story is supposed to take place in the sky."

Tanabata legend

Fuyubi Nakamura, assistant professor at the department of Asian studies at the University of British Columbia, said the word Tanabata literally translates to the evening of the seventh month in Japanese. 

"So usually it's celebrated on July 7, which is the seventh month in the Gregorian calendar," she said.

However, she added, due to the disparity between the traditionally used Lunar Solar calendar and the Gregorian, Tanabata is also observed during August.

The day is marked to honour the union of two star-crossed lovers, Hikoboshi, a cow herder and princess Orihime, a weaver and the daughter of the lord of the sky, who were separated by the Milky Way.

"The story's origin is Chinese where the princess is supposed to represent the star Vega and the cow herder is the star Altair," Nakamura said.

As the story goes, when the two met and fell in love, they began to neglect their duties. The princess stopped weaving and Hikoboshi ignored the cows. Angered, princess Orihime's father decided to punish them by barring the two lovers from seeing each other. 

"Eventually, the king allowed the two to meet only once a year on the evening of the seventh month."

The digitally created artworks will be projected against the night sky on the inner surface of the planetarium's dome, at the space centre's theatre on Friday.

The next day, the star show will be presented in a portable inflatable planetarium for free at Oppenheimer Park as part of the Powell Street Festival.

The artworks will be showcased with narration by particle physicist Miho Wakai, who will be reciting the story of Tanabata.

"The story of Tanabata has been around for a long time and I grew up loving the Tanabata festivals," said Wakai.

Confluence of science and myth

The two-day star show festival is designed to attract a younger audience. Wakai said she hopes the show gets young minds interested in astronomy. 

Apart from hearing the age-old story, attendees will also be able to take a look at the night sky and observe the objects of the story like the two stars Vega and Altair at the planetarium. 

"It's a nice way to bring people in with a nice simple story and then lure their attention and explain the science part," she said. 

She will also be sharing aspects of her research on dark matter, followed by a Q&A after the show.

Wakai works on an experiment called Belle-II where scientists accelerate particles and collide them together in hopes of producing dark matter particles. 

Dark matter is one of the greatest mysteries in modern science today, she said.

It's an invisible substance that doesn't interact with light. The universe contains five times as much dark matter than normal matter, she added.

According to Nakamura, the artist, the show provides an opportunity to create an intersection between art and astronomy, science and culture.  

"We might have younger kids coming in to find out about the folk tale and then there's this mysterious thing about dark matter that they didn't expect to hear about," he said.

"These sorts of cross-cultural experiences are valuable in opening your mind to all kinds of possibilities."