{"id":75178,"date":"2013-11-05T14:03:32","date_gmt":"2013-11-05T05:03:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/fukuoka-now.com\/?p=43984"},"modified":"2016-04-01T01:31:49","modified_gmt":"2016-03-31T16:31:49","slug":"art-brut-japonais-at-fukuoka-art-museum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/en\/art-brut-japonais-at-fukuoka-art-museum\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Art Brut Japonais\u2019 at Fukuoka Art Museum Report"},"content":{"rendered":"

Report by Katie Forster for Fukuoka Now.<\/em><\/p>\n

Marie Suzuki\u2019s\u00a0abstract bodily depictions, an oozing mass of\u00a0breasts, sharp objects and genitals, greet all unassuming visitors to the\u00a0\u2018Art Brut Japonais\u2019 exhibition at Fukuoka Art Museum.\u00a0Disembodied body parts are\u00a0shrunken and multiplied, then\u00a0consumed by anonymous bulging orifices\u00a0in her work, creating a phobic collage which screams out its disturbing vision of violence, sexuality and memory. Her 2007 work\u00a0<\/span>Nobody Can See<\/i>\u00a0(pictured below) has been chosen as the poster for the collection, which aims to grab attention for\u00a0its\u00a0showcase of work by non-traditional Japanese artists.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Picture

SUZUKI Marie, Nobody Can See , 2007<\/em>
Borderless Art Museum NO-MA. Source<\/a>.<\/em><\/p><\/div>\n

\u2018Art Brut\u2019 is the French term for artworks created by those who have received no prior artistic training or exposure. The creativity of the mentally ill or disabled is particularly emphasised in this exhibition, positing\u00a0the visual arts\u00a0as a possible form of therapy as well as self-expression. This exhibition of Japanese \u2018art brut\u2019, or \u2018outsider art\u2019, was originally displayed in the Halle Saint Pierre museum in Paris in 2010-11. The contemporary pieces\u00a0on display\u00a0are vastly varied in media, theme and scope, and with over 600\u00a0sharing a\u00a0relatively small space, the exhibition\u00a0feels as intense as some of the works themselves.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Picture<\/p>\n

The high volume of\u00a0artworks\u00a0has been approached by grouping the\u00a0exhibits\u00a0into rough themes.\u00a0In the \u2018portrait\u2019 room,\u00a0the trauma of\u00a0separation is\u00a0recounted\u00a0through Takako Shibata\u2019s repeated rectangular\u00a0renditions of her mother in the same blue suit. Meanwhile, in the \u2018transport\u2019-themed room,\u00a0Ninofuo Mizuta\u2019s remarkably detailed record of different train fronts and scale paper models of each\u00a0carriage\u00a0are\u00a0a reminder of the powers of the human mind for recall and precision.<\/span><\/p>\n

The\u00a0\u2018locations\u2019 room mirrors this detail with large pen drawings of Nagoya city by Yuji Tsuji, whose attention to detail rivals\u00a0Street View for accuracy, and certainly paints a more evocative picture of the what it feels like to live in a busy city \u2013 at times both comforting and claustrophobic.<\/span><\/p>\n

Whether or not it is possible to classify such original works in this way, the\u00a0unofficial\u00a0organisation of the exhibition\u00a0allows the viewer to cultivate a train of thought that develops\u00a0from\u00a0one room\u00a0to the next. In a\u00a0section concentrated\u00a0on the written word,\u00a0a cabinet houses a scroll covered in\u00a06 months\u2019 worth of\u00a0tiny\u00a0calligraphy. Although\u00a0no one\u00a0knows\u00a0what it says, the patterns of the vertical kanji form darker clouds and lighter spots, transforming the shape of the\u00a0characters\u00a0into art itself.\u00a0Hiragana characters are also used in colourful collages (pictured below), their overlapping forms used as a visual diaries by artist\u00a0Sakuta Yuichi.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Picture

SAKUTA Yuichi<\/em>
Seeking the Caf\u00e9 I Used<\/em>
to Love But Have Lost \u2163<\/em>
2009, Artist. Source<\/a>.<\/em><\/p><\/div>\n

From the simplest tracing of favorite magazine photos, their very flimsiness hinting at the fragility of\u00a0our\u00a0mental condition, to ambitious traditional-style sculptures in the final room,\u00a0the works share one common theme: what is it to create, not as an ‘artist’, but as a human, expressing oneself with no regard to what \u2018should\u2019 be made? One of the largest and most striking works in the collection is\u00a0an\u00a0abstract\u00a0depiction\u00a0of a body\u00a0by Seizo Tashima, made from small, pointed\u00a0organic pins,\u00a0which\u00a0spread outwards\u00a0where the head should be,\u00a0as if\u00a0a fatal\u00a0explosion of the vital creative organ had just taken place.<\/span><\/p>\n

Whilst\u00a0it is easy to be inspired by the collection,\u00a0the merits of some works\u00a0are to be debated \u2013 as we stare at a row of scribbled-on underpants and pyjamas, my friend turns to me and asks: \u2018is this art?\u2019 Good question, and one the entire exhibition tries to turn on its head. Yet although the collection was conceived of as a way to keep the artworks together and to stop them from becoming lost on their return to Japan, perhaps some\u00a0further\u00a0selection and editing would further enhance their effect. However, this does not apply to every work, which between them tackle philosophy, creativity, utopias and nightmares: this glimpse into the inner minds of Japan\u2019s \u2018non-artistic\u2019 artists is fascinating.<\/span><\/p>\n

Art Brut Japonais\u00a0is at Fukuoka Art Museum until 11\/24.\u00a09:30~17:30. Closed 11\/5. Adult\u00a0<\/i>\u00a51000, high school and college student\u00a0\u00a5700. Official HP:\u00a0http:\/\/www.fukuoka-art-museum.jp\/english\/<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Report by Katie Forster for Fukuoka Now. Marie Suzuki\u2019s\u00a0abstract bodily depictions, an oozing mass of\u00a0breasts, sharp objects and genitals, greet all unassuming visitors to the\u00a0\u2018Art Brut Japonais\u2019 exhibition at Fukuoka Art Museum.\u00a0Disembodied body parts are\u00a0shrunken and multiplied, then\u00a0consumed by anonymous bulging orifices\u00a0in her work, creating a phobic collage which screams out its disturbing vision of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6391,"featured_media":43985,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_locale":"en_US","_original_post":"43984","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4914],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-75178","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-others","en-US"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/11\/Picture-1-SUZUKI-Marie.jpg?fit=573%2C684&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75178","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6391"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75178"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75178\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":84878,"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75178\/revisions\/84878"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43985"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75178"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75178"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75178"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}