ARTIFACTS

Since the late 19th century, Japanese art has been schizophrenically split into yoga (Western-style) and nihonga (Japanese-style). The latter arose as a self-conscious response to the inroads of the former. Nevertheless, when nihonga took up the challenge of Western art, it was unable to avoid borrowing some of its ideas, most notably the romantically inflated concept of the “divine” artist. But instead of Michelangelo or van Gogh, nihonga found its role models in the elite artist/craftsmen of the Rinpa school. The Yamatane Museum of Art’s exhibition What Did Nihonga Learn from Rinpa? uses 50 mainly large works to look at echoes of the school in the works of 20th-century nihonga artists. Particularly worth seeing is Kaii Higashiyama’s vast seascape Rising Tide and Gyoshu Hayami’s Falling Camellias. Through Dec 25. See exhibition listings (Ginza/ Kyobashi/ Tokyo) for details. CBL Giveaway! Metropolis is offering readers ten free tickets to “What Did Nihonga Learn from Rinpa?” For your chance to see this excellent exhibition, email the following information by Wednesday, December 17, to editor@metropolis.co.jp: 1. Name; 2. Address; 3. Age; 4. Home country; 5. Last exhibition you visited Include the text “Nihonga” in the subject line. Winners will be selected at random.

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By Andrew Conti

Taro Okamoto Memorial Award

Twenty-two artists are honored for following in taro Okamoto’s avant-garde footsteps

Ryuki Yamamoto, The War in an Individual no.1, 185.2x227.3cm, acrylic on canvas

Each year, a small group of academics and museum curators from around Japan gather to judge contestants for the Taro Okamoto Memorial Award for Contemporary Art. The group seeks artists who step outside of the norm and push boundaries, as Okamoto did himself. This year, after reviewing well over 500 submissions, the judges decided on 22 artists who best reflect that spirit.

The result of their efforts is one of the most thought-provoking and satisfying exhibitions so far this year. The museum’s spacious galleries are transformed into a veritable playground of inspiration, as works of manifold form and content offer critiques and counterpoints to contemporary culture both global and domestic.
In the gallery’s central glass enclosure, visitors immediately confront the simultaneously compelling and revolting Boundary by Sayuri Hirama. This conical mound first appears naturally serene and inviting, but a closer inspection reveals its twisted structure to be of human hair.

Yuri Sakamoto, Chop Chop Meat, 120x200x300cm, mixed media

Likewise, Koji Tanada’s small broken family of impish, wood-carved children is equally abhorrent and captivating. The positively creepy gazes held between these siblings emanate a devilish and dreadful intensity. Viewed in light of a wave of youth crime in Japan, these pieces—explicitly titled Awaits for His Father and Awaits for His Mother—are steeped in an unsettling critique of the family.

Takehito Fujii addresses politics through figureheads of power in both Japan and the international community. In painstakingly crafted metal masks of Junichiro Koizumi, George W. Bush, Kim Jong Il and others, Fujii creates images of powerful men that are caricatures and symbolic markers of their influence on popular culture. He then further intensifies their jarring humor through large photographs in which children wear disturbing masks while posing in mock-serious gestures.

Takehito Fujii, Sculpture Punishment Plus, 350x700x 150cm, iron, wood, and inkjet prints Photos Courtesy Taro Okamoto Museum of Art, Kawasaki

Among others, Ryuki Yamamoto, Aiko Iwamoto and Yuri Sakamoto present socio-politically poetic works that grapple with elements of the youth-oriented cultural landscape.

Through a video record of a Coming-of-Age Day ceremony (Iwamoto), a self-portrait as a warring army of high school students (Yamamoto), and a domestic scene with flayed livestock (Sakamoto), these artists focus emotionally charged social commentary on contemporary Japan.

Also noteworthy are more ambiguous works. Satoru Tamura’s Weight Sculptures, for example, utilizes ready-made sculptures in a playfully Duchampian gesture. By carefully removing or adding mass until an even weight is achieved—such as in the piece 2,000-gram Cow—Tamura ascribes an uncertain importance to banal objects.

This exhibition’s appeal rests in its brazenly balanced mix of artists of all temperaments and styles. Works that act confrontationally amid political and social realms rub shoulders with those that offer the sly, sensual or ornamental theses. Each piece occupies a moment of changing trajectory within the show, urging viewers to observe and absorb their individual presences.

There are, however, a few noticeable moments of inexplicable silence throughout. Dark gaps in the gallery seem wider than the norm. Yet these apparent curatorial missteps resolve themselves by pointing to a delightfully sneaky surprise in the last piece. Kohei Saito’s Being Left out of Selection, a quirky sculpture of intellectual wit, pokes fun at the juried art show itself, ending the exhibition with a final wink from outside the exit.

Taro Okamoto Museum of Art, Kawasaki, until Apr 10. See exhibition listings for details.

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