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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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1 November 2013 |
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| Saya Irie: Recreated Images |
| 7 - 28 September 2013 |
Tokyo Gallery
(Tokyo) |
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| Irie makes sculptures out of eraser residue. In this exhibition she erases the figures from picture postcards of famous paintings -- one of Edgar Degas's dancers, a portrait by Ryusei Kishida of his daughter Reiko -- then recreates the figure as a tiny three-dimensional object made of eraser shavings. It's a marvelous bit of craftsmanship, but runs the risk of being viewed as no more than that: the rendering of a flat-plane figure in 3D. |
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| Takako Okumura: "Make That" |
| 2 - 28 September 2013 |
LIXIL Gallery 2
(Tokyo) |
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| Two sculptures occupied the gallery, both made out of white fabric that resembles marble. One was a reproduction of the Manneken Pis. The other was a monstrous, twisted figure that bumped up against the ceiling, allegedly inspired by the pose of Michelangelo's David. One was left wondering what exactly the "that" of the show title refers to. |
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| Shusuke Tanaka |
| 10 - 22 September 2013 |
Gallery Morning Kyoto
(Kyoto) |
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| With their peculiar motifs and titles, their precarious brushstrokes, compositions, and colors, Tanaka's paintings arouse unsettled emotions -- anxiety, irritability, restlessness. This show featured scenes from his native Wakayama Prefecture and the neighborhood around his studio. Though the images are of places and people familiar to the artist, his depictions testify to the boundlessness of his imagination. |
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| Masanori Hata: Thanksgiving on summerday? |
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TS4312
(Tokyo)
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| The centerpiece of the show, a work on DVD, presents two hermaphroditic "gods." The figures, which move in herky-jerky fashion, were created via computer cut-and-paste of numerous male and female faces and bodies. There is virtually no text; interpretation is left to the viewer. Both the concept and its method of execution suggest an artist possessed by unique stresses and biases. |
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| Bakufu Ohno: Art Portfolio of Fishes |
| 27 July - 23 September 2013 |
Tokyo Station Gallery
(Tokyo) |
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| Painter and printmaker Ohno (1888-1976) first studied Western-style oil painting, but switched to Nihonga -- a resume that stood him in good stead for a career in natural history art, a genre that demands both a Western eye for realistic detail and a mastery of line and pattern reminiscent of Nihonga. His renowned illustrations for Dai-Nippon Gyorui Gashu (lit. Japanese Fish Picture Collection) apply the same loving care to rocks and water plants as they do to the fish, in a style that is nothing if not Nihongaesque. |
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| Shima Tanno: Gentle Wind |
| 4 - 29 September 2013 |
Window Gallery Oct
(Kyoto) |
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| About 20 years ago, photographer Tanno visited Nishinoshima, one of the Oki Islands in the Japan Sea off the Shimane coast. Struck by the natural beauty of the place, she moved there a half year later. In this series she records the changes in the sea as it reflects the shifting colors of the sky. Both the images and their titles eloquently evoke the artist's love of nature and her life on the island. Indeed, this reviewer would like to know more about Tanno herself -- someone who actually underwent a life-changing experience and acted on it. |
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| Nobuyuki Osaki: "T" |
| 17 - 28 September 2013 |
gallery 16
(Kyoto) |
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| Osaki has earned a reputation both at home and abroad for videos of paintings and wall murals that melt and disintegrate. This installation centered around "traces" of the childhood memories of "T," a friend of Osaki who provided him with personal recollections and photographs, augmented by Internet searches and visits to the actual locations by the artist. The resulting mood is one of evanescence -- the fleeting, fickle nature of memory as a source of information. |
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| Junko Matsuno: Liberation |
| 24 - 29 September 2013 |
Art Space Niji
(Kyoto) |
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| Matsuno drips sumi ink onto paper, wipes it off, then meticulously traces, with an ultrafine-tipped pen, the outlines of the gray blotches and myriad tiny dots that remain. Several such works were on display in this solo show. The painstaking nature of her work is immediately apparent, but upon leisurely examination, these delicate patterns take on a more profound aspect -- that of the entire cosmos. The mind-boggling effort that went into these works inspires not just admiration, but awe. |
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| Exhibition by Condemned Artists: They Are Not the Only Prisoners |
| 28 - 29 September 2013 |
Shibuya Cultural Center Owada
(Tokyo) |
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| Previously held at the Tomonotsu Museum in Hiroshima Prefecture, this traveling exhibition recently came to Shibuya, Tokyo. What strikes one is how scrupulous the death-row artists are in their work; most of them, it seems, are concerned less with painting a picture per se than with immersing themselves in the process of careful reproduction -- hence content is secondary. A few, however, clearly have something to say. Out of 33 artists, only three address the issue of capital punishment. Coincidentally or not, two of those three have already been executed. |
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