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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 2019 |
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| Kotori Kawashima: I Like Things That Are Not Yet Named |
| 20 July - 9 September 2019 |
Canon Gallery S
(Tokyo) |
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| Viewers of this show likely reacted to Kawashima's work much as they do to Instagram photos. Typical was an enlargement of a shot of cakes and parfaits in a display case. Instagram images tend to elicit feelings of deja vu or self-affirmation, and that is precisely the effect of Kawashima's photos, which were interspersed here with verses by the poet Shuntaro Tanikawa, quoted in the title. |
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| Sho Niiro: Heri Side |
| 10 - 28 September 2019 |
Fugensha
(Tokyo) |
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| A term coined by photographer Niiro, "heri side" incorporates the Japanese word heri, meaning edge or margin, which he uses to refer to Tokyo's shoreline. Viewing the metropolis from its bayside periphery, he says, yields a compelling new perspective because "the energy of destruction and renewal at the center gradually attenuates toward its outer edges." There, as these photos testify, he has captured scenery with a curious aura, like afterimages of the city in its endless cycles of death and rebirth. |
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Kaori Endo: Gravity and Rainbow |
| 30 August - 22 September 2019 |
Shiseido Gallery
(Tokyo) |
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| In an installation titled Handkerchief, sheets of used cloth from northeastern Japan, Okinawa, and Southeast Asia, covered with a soft patina of silkworm threads, hang from the gallery ceiling. As the coloring of these rectangular surfaces of varying sizes gradually fades over the years, they come to resemble sublime works of abstract expressionist art. The scraps of fabric, some of which once served as dustcloths, work clothes, and even parachutes, have a palpable, powerful presence. |
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| Michiko Nakatani: Mask in the Bright Day / Harden the Night |
| 9 August - 1 September 2019 |
Art Front Gallery
(Tokyo) |
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| Inside a black cubic object, one discerns a human figure amid blades of grass. As its title, Harden the Night, suggests, Nakatani created this "sculpture of darkness" by hardening black translucent resin in a negative mould inside the cube. Though we see paintings of darkness often enough, a sculpture depicting darkness is a rare thing indeed. |
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| Yosuke Takeda: "Ash without fire here" |
| 7 September - 26 October 2019 |
Taka Ishii Gallery Photography/Film
(Tokyo) |
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| Two of the works in Takeda's Digital Flare series, produced by pointing the camera directly at a strong light source, are large 120 x 160 cm prints in metallic frames that augment their color-saturated gorgeousness. Complementing these works are a new series of still and video images of golden light reflected off the surface of water, which have a more pronounced decorative aspect than the Digital Flare pieces. |
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| Mariko Takahashi: Souvenir |
| 15 September - 6 October 20199 |
photographers' gallery
(Tokyo) |
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| Takahashi's photographs are simple affairs, but she has arranged two series here in intriguing pairs. One set consists of portraits of "friends who have lived through different experiences, both happy and sad," the other of pictures of "souvenirs that evoke little memories of time spent in various places." These souvenirs and portraits resonate nicely with one another, generating a warm and soothing mood. It is clear that Takahashi has been painstaking in her choice of subjects, the coloration of her prints, and the juxtaposition of the images. |
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| K.P.S. Noboru Ueki + Yushi Kobayashi |
| 14 September - 6 October 2019 |
MEM
(Tokyo) |
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| Ueki and Kobayashi were two of the most active members of the Kyoto Photography Society (K.P.S.), an amateur photographers' group founded by Motohiko Goto in 1920. Though both men produced painting-like "art photography" before World War II, their styles changed dramatically after the war. Beginning in 1948 they held an annual "Free Photographic Art" exhibition that gave full rein to photomontages, close-ups, hand-painted prints and other avant-garde techniques. |
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| Shusei Kobayakawa: Infinity and Tranquility |
| 31 August - 16 September 2019 |
Kashima Arts
(Tokyo) |
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| A Nihonga artist, Kobayakawa (1889-1974) is best known for his war painting Shield of the Nation, in which the corpse of a soldier in uniform lies face-up with the rising sun of the Japanese flag covering his face. The jet-black background makes it appear as if the body is floating in space. A halo-like ring hangs above the head, and if one looks closely a larger arc is visible over the entire body. When the Japanese Army rejected the painting, Kobayakawa blacked out the cherry-blossom petals that originally covered the soldier. In its revised form, the work seems to carry an anti-war message. |
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