Artists exhibited: Mel BOCHNER, Alighiero BOETTI, Daisuke FURUIKE, Nan GOLDIN, Leiko IKEMURA, Yves KLEIN, Futoshi MIYAGI, Edvard MUNCH, Tomoharu MURAKAMI, Roman OPALKA, Charlotte POSENENSKE, Mitsuru TOKUTOMI
The awareness of "self" comes to us unexpectedly. However, most of our daily time passes while we are absorbed in something or distracted without paying attention to ourselves. My memories are very fragmented, and my sense of continuity between yesterday's me and today's me is very vague. Is there really such a thing as "one me"? Since the modern era, when works of art have come to be regarded as expressions of the artist (i.e., the unique me), artists have raised questions about me, the artist, and uniqueness in various ways, including skepticism. In Munch's Lovers, the heads seem to melt into each other. Daisuke Koike's images in which the familiar figure of Christ dissolves and transforms. I am an entity, and the image that I am supposed to be sure of is very uncertain, and in it we can have the anxiety of the collapse of the self, as well as the dream of assimilation into the other. In front of Leiko Ikemura's work, which invites images of other forms, we can imagine an existence beyond human beings, and think about ancient times and the future, far away from the present world that captures me.Miyagiftoshi spins an associative thread between private and personal narratives and universal and mythological narratives, and contemplates identity while traversing time and space. Nan Goldin, on the other hand, weaves a personal and magnificent "ballad" by focusing on familiar subjects, including herself.Mitsuru Tokutomi and Yves Klein, despite their different approaches, have continued to focus on the existence of the self in their work. Tokutomi's "My Attribute" can be said to be the transference of the filter of "I" that inevitably appears when we perceive something to the work. Klein, on the other hand, realizes this self through his patented color, IKM (International Klein Blue). The eye-opening blue painting is unmistakably Klein's work because of that very blue.Mel Bockner, Alighiero Boetti, and Charlotte Pozenenske were among those who questioned the privileged position of the artist and attempted to overthrow it. Bockner exhibited a bunch of copies of idea drawings left by various people as his work. Boetti commissioned people from various regions and professions to create works. Pozenenske's yellow aluminum plates, which look like industrial products, were designed from the beginning to be able to be reproduced in multiple ways, and the way they were displayed was left up to others.Since 1965, Roman Opalka has been painting numbers, starting with 1 and working his way up. As a Catholic believer, Tomoharu Murakami's work, which is carried out with the same regularity as his daily prayers, has reached a level of selflessness that goes beyond the realm of art, such as the "individuality of the artist.
The uncertainty of the "I" invites us to anxiety, but it can also be read as the possibility of liberating the self. I may be you, I may be the past me, I may be the future me, and so on. The expanding self may also lead to tolerance for me, others, and the world. Now that I am forced to isolate myself, I hope it will help me to imagine that I am open.
Sources:
VISION. Who is Making the work? exhibition info
VISION. Who is Making the work? exhibition info / Japanese
press release / Japanese
Toyota Municipal Museum of Art
8-5-1, Kozakahonmachi, Toyota
Aichi 471-0034
Japan
Toyota Municipal Museum of Art online