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Picks is a monthly sampling of Japan's art scene, offering short reviews of exhibitions at museums and galleries in recent weeks, with an emphasis on contemporary art by young artists. |
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Nobuyuki Osaki: Phantom |
| 16 - 27 September 2008 |
galerie 16
(Kyoto) |
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| Osaki uses ink, spangles and beads to draw images of young girls on water-soluble sheets. He then makes images of the images as they disperse in water. Sometimes the original pictures expand gently; sometimes they break apart abruptly. This poignant tension speaks of the simultaneous fragility and strength of all things that vanish eventually. |
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| Kikuko Morimoto: Traces of Use |
| 16 - 28 September 2008 |
Art Space Niji
(Kyoto) |
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| In this installation of old tools and walls covered with bird figures, everything has been covered with luminescent orange paint. When the entrance curtain is shut and blue lights are switched on, the objects suddenly acquire a powerful presence. The old wooden implements, with their rugged beauty, remind one of human beings battling the elements, the orange color exploding from them like the life-force itself. |
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Rooftop Paradise |
| 13 September - 30 November 2008 |
Rooftop of BankART Studio NYK
(Kanagawa) |
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| Yokohama's BankART project is loaning out its space in the former NYK Shipping Line warehouse to the city's Triennale in the daytime, but has offered the rooftop to any artists or architects who wish to reserve it off-hours, morning and evening. The only stipulation is to make full use of the time and space. Takers include Tatsuji Ushijima, Takayoshi Kitagawa, and art units MIKAN, Koizumi Atelier, and namaiki. |
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| Naomi Ashida: Ladybird and Dance |
| 4 - 21 September 2008 |
Taiyo Jimu human+art
(Kyoto) |
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| The centerpiece of these new works by ceramicist Ishida is a series of covered dishes with motifs from the zodiac. Other small objects and drawings are inspired by flora and fauna. Known best for her earthenware, Ishida here displays a fresh hand at drawing too; viewing her work is like reading a picture book with no text and making up your own story. |
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Tomoko Kashiki: New Works |
| 5 - 27 September 2008 |
MEM
(Osaka) |
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| Kashiki creates a distinctive mood in these new paintings by applying a sander to the picture surface. Colors, textures and motifs melt into the background, producing an impression of transience and instability that is impossible to forget. In "Park," what resembles at a distance the Buddhist goddess Kannon astride an elephant proves close-up to be a young girl on a playground ride -- yet the effect is still holy. |
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Aya Itagaki: Nameless Mountains |
| 22 September - 4 October 2008 |
Gallery wks.
(Osaka) |
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| In her earlier "Kitchen Friend" series, Itagaki painted pictures of salmon fillets and tofu posing as roads and townscapes. This time she has turned fish, daikon radishes and other edibles into mountain ranges. Her playfulness is also apparent in her titles, which like the paintings seem determined to elicit a chuckle from the most stolid viewer. |
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Kanako Fujiwara |
| 22 - 27 September 2008 |
O Gallery eyes
(Osaka) |
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| Fujiwara's acrylic paintings and watercolor drawings depict a world of violent dream images and childhood memories that are terrifying, yet not vicious. Addressing fundamental issues of self and existence, the artist paints images that arise in her only when she has gained some emotional distance from them, she says. Their ferocity hints at the physical and mental toll this process takes. |
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Shinta Inoue: Animal Scape |
| 23 September - 5 October 2008 |
Contemporary Art Space Osaka
(Osaka) |
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| A retrospective of videos and drawings from Inoue's ten-year ongoing Shepherd Project. Surreal touches abound, like the erratically rotating mirror ball that spookily illuminates dangling upside-down animal cutouts. The mood is that of a fairy tale about to unfold in a twilit forest of the imagination. |
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Shigokai Residents' Conference Vol. 2 |
| 20, 21, 23 September 2008 |
Motomachi Building, Yokohama
(Kanagawa) |
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| Located across the street from Yokohama's BankART 1929 art complex, the fourth and fifth floors of the Motomachi Building have been occupied for the past two years by a growing number of artists, designers and architects. This open studio event included a symposium with architects Yasuaki Onoda and Masashi Sogabe. |
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Sadamiti Hirasawa: Sixty Years Since the Teigin Incident |
| 21 - 28 September 2008 |
Gallery TEN
(Tokyo) |
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An accomplished painter who was sentenced to death for the Teikoku Bank (Teigin) mass-poisoning incident of 1948, Hirasawa (1892-1987) died in prison at age 95, protesting his innocence to the end. This show offers some forty of the over 5,000 works he painted while on death row. Though crudely drawn, this is hardly surprising given the artist's circumstances: painting from memory, without proper materials, haunted by the threat of execution at any time.
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