beuys on/off is a cross-disciplinary art project organised by the Goethe Institut Tokyo to commemorate the centenary of German artist Joseph Beuys. One of the most influential yet controversial artists of the latter half of the twentieth century, Beuys started his career as an artist after military service in World War II, and proactively engaged with issues of education, ecology, economy and politics through his expanded idea of art against the backdrop of the upheavals of the Cold War.

More than thirty years after Beuys visit to Japan in 1984, beuys on/off is responding to Joseph Beuys from the perspective of Eurasia. Connecting artists, musicians, activists, writers, domestic workers and academics across Eurasia, beuys on/off both critically reinterprets Beuys’s multi-faceted practices and updates them by addressing contemporary urgencies through both on- and off-line programmes.