With just days to go to the official opening of Tokyo 2020, an online festival in a virtual Olympic stadium was watched by 850,000 people.
Children from around the world were invited to submit artwork to be shown during the live event.
Originally the organizers had planned to host the ‘wassai’ festival in the actual Olympic Stadium, but the plans fell victim to the pandemic early on.
“Our goal this time is to bring the world together, even if only virtually to bring people into a circle (Wa), so even if you’re not there in person there is a feeling of unity, and that’s what we wanted to achieve as the Games will have no spectators,” project director Taro Nishimura said.
The diversity-themed event featured live performances by singer Aoi Yamada and model Myu Ashihara.
