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Picks is a monthly sampling of Japan's art scene, offering commentary by a variety of reviewers about exhibitions at museums and galleries in recent weeks, with an emphasis on contemporary art by young artists. |
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3 December 2012 |
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| Natsuko Sakamoto: Still Life |
| 11 October - 10 November 2012 |
Kenji Taki Gallery
(Tokyo) |
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| In Sakamoto's recent paintings, indeterminate blue-gray shapes rustle restlessly against dark backgrounds. These could be landscapes, or figures, or indeed still lifes as the title suggests, but are really none of the above -- yet they exude the aura of objects too much to be truly abstract. One gets the impression of a dramatic "deepening" of Sakamoto's work, but whether she is "evolving" or not is hard to say. |
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| Koutarou Ushijima: Intentional Accident |
| 3 - 27 October 2012 |
LIXIL Gallery 2
(Tokyo)
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| On a number of shelves sit arrays of junk -- a broken cup, a toy horse with its ears torn off, buttons and coins. Above each shelf hangs a large sheet with text sewn onto it, telling a story somehow related to the odds and ends below. Whether any of these episodes are true is hardly the point. What fascinates is the fact that Ushijima conveys them, not in print like an ordinary conceptual artist might, but through hand-embroidered characters. If these were printed texts they would more likely smell like fabrications, and one would have no urge to read them. |
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Self-Portraits 2012: New Self-Portraits and Sketches by Nine Artists
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| 1 - 20 October 2012 |
Gallery-58
(Tokyo) |
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| The nine artists who contributed their self-portraits to this unique show average 75.8 years of age: Genpei Akasegawa, Yutokutaishi Akiyama, Tatsuo Ikeda, Miyako Ishiuchi, Ushio Shinohara, Shintaro Tanaka, Natsuyuki Nakanishi, Hiroshi Nakamura, and Tatsumi Yoshino. Akasegawa submitted a rendering in pencil of a scanned image of his skull, giving it the title Halation in reference to the blur in the scan caused by his silver teeth. Shinohara offered one of his typically zestful "boxing paintings," belying his advanced years with its vigor. These are people who will not go gently into the night, and this reviewer for one wants to be just like them. |
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| Kasumi apartment |
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Gloria building
(Tokyo)
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| This was the fifth exhibition by Yadokari Tokyo, a project that puts up temporary shows in empty buildings around the capital (yadokari is Japanese for hermit crab, and literally means "dwelling-borrower"). Featuring 12 artists, among them Ryosuke Ogino, Mitsumasa Kadota, and Kaoru Murakami, it occupied an office building hard by the prime minister's residence in Kasumigaseki, the government district. The impression was of paintings and photos slapped casually on walls, and sculptures and installations scattered randomly around the floor. But there was a freshness to this hit-and-run approach, as if the organizers didn't want to waste time worrying about appearances, or permits, before scuttling off to their next venue. |
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| Naomi Hasegawa |
| 22 - 27 October 2012 |
O Gallery eyes
(Osaka) |
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| Hasegawa's motifs range from Old Testament stories (Paradise Lost, Wrestling with the Angel) to scenes she encountered on visits to Okinawa and Auschwitz. In a series of paintings entitled a prayer she depicts people giving themselves over to worship or grief. These sound like burdensomely heavy themes, yet the works are not in the least despairing. Rather, they are remarkably tranquil, and brim with the artist's affection for her subjects -- individuals living ordinary lives as best they can. |
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| Michiko Nakatani: Drawing 2007-2012 |
| 18 October - 25 November 2012 |
MZ arts
(Kanagawa) |
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| This second show at MZ arts, a new gallery in Yokohama's trendy Hinodecho district, featured Michiko Nakatani, who has recently garnered acclaim for her reliefs (and reverse-reliefs) of human and animal figures. Here, however, she presented drawings she has produced over the past five years. Since she is still in her twenties, one might wish for signs of a bit more change or experimentation over a five-year period. On the other hand, her work maintains a consistently high level of both taste and tastiness, so perhaps such carping is moot. |
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| Kunio Iwaya + Hiroaki Kuwabara: View from the Window |
| 6 - 28 October 2012 |
LIBRAIRIE6
(Tokyo) |
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| Known as a specialist in French literature and surrealism, Iwaya no doubt considers himself at best a hobbyist at photography. But from this, his fifth exhibition, it's clear that he's moved beyond that appellation; one now senses in his work the dedication of a professional. In this joint show with Kuwabara, a "scope objet" artist who produces miniature works viewed through peephole devices, we can see that Iwaya's eye has matured into that of a true photographer who knows what he wants to capture and how. |
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| Akiko Otake: Gaze + Wonder NY1980 |
| 19 - 27 October 2012 |
Toki-no-Wasuremono
(Tokyo) |
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| Otake exhibited a series of monochrome photos she shot during a lengthy stay in New York City, from 1980 to 1981. On display were 15 large-format, 41 x 50.8 cm prints, as well as 12 previously published 20.3 x 25.4 cm portfolio prints. Both series consist mostly of street scenes, with nary a human figure in sight; one gets the feeling that this is a self-imposed isolation that envelops the photographer. Otake's straightforward, no-frills confrontation with these cityscapes is a harbinger of the approach seen in her diverse work since that time.
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| Yasue Kodama: Deep Tone - Wind's Dwelling |
| 4 - 28 October 2012 |
gallery21yo-j
(Tokyo) |
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| In this small show of six oil paintings of trees, the two largest works depict a woods thickly swathed in autumn foliage, while the remaining four gaze up at the sky through a thinning canopy of yellow leaves on branches. In the first two pieces, a pale, grayish-blue sky barely makes its presence known behind the dominant ochre of the trees, while in the others the equation is reversed, with sparse bits of ochre scattered across a blue-gray background. This contrast sets up a lovely call-and-response among the paintings on the wall, turning the entire gallery into an installation of sorts. |
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| Melting Core |
| 7 September - 7 October 2012 |
Gallery OUT of PLACE
(Nara) |
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| Subtitled "Five Views of Supports," this show took a fresh look at the materials -- canvas, paper, and so on -- commonly used as a support for paintings and other modes of artistic expression. Of the five artists featured, the one contributing the most provocative work was Kazuaki Yuri, who took huge stacks of office paper, dipped them in colored liquids, then dried them to produce his series Horizon. The swelling and warping of paper, wooden frames, and the like are natural phenomena that inevitably occur during the production process. In the instant when the expressive gestures of the "self" and these natural phenomena -- the "other" -- meet one another in or on their paper "support," something refreshingly novel is born. |
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