The three curators from Japan were chosen through an open call for applications. All the curators and mentors joined an online meeting to match up based on their respective expertise and interests. Tsukamoto Mari (Curator, The Museum of Art, Kochi) was assigned to collaborate with The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (MOCA).

Tsukamoto had many online meetings with MOCA curator Alex Sloane. In their first meeting, she learned about the Geffen Contemporary, which will be the venue, and the WAREHOUSE program, which is organized by Sloane. After that, Tsukamoto considered which emerging Japanese artists to propose as candidates for the project. With advice from program mentor, Kataoka Mami, she then prepared a presentation in English to propose a number of candidate artists.

Sloane came to Japan and visited Tokyo and The Museum of Art, Kochi. Tsukamoto met with Sloane along with museum director Yasuda Atsuo, and they exchanged information about the differences between the two museums (exhibition rooms and environment). They also viewed the permanent exhibition showcasing the museum's collection, as well as the collection of works by photographer Ishimoto Yasuhiro, who was born in San Francisco but had ties to Kochi. Sloane also examined a variety of Japanese contemporary art works at museums and galleries in Tokyo, and exchanged views with Tsukamoto about the candidate artists.

After a series of discussions that took place between December 2024 and March 2025 regarding the direction of the exhibition and the artists, MES (Arai Takeru and Tanikawa Kanae) was selected as the artist.

The MES duo visited Kochi City and Shimanto City. In Kochi, they toured The Museum of Art, Kochi and in Shimanto they visited places connected to events and people relevant to the research.

The MES duo and Tsukamoto visited Los Angeles for a 10-day period of research. As they inspected the enormous venue, which was converted from a former police car warehouse, they talked to Sloane about the nature of their work and the direction of their exhibition.