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PostWar & Contemporary
3439*
KAZUO SHIRAGA(1924 Amagasaki/Japan 2008)
Untitled. 1961.
Oil on canvas.
Signed in Japanese lower right: Shiraga,
also signed and dated on the reverse:
Kazuo Shiraga 1961.
24.4 x 34.3 cm.
Provenance:
- Tokyo Gallery, Japan.
- Acquired from the above by „Estate 11
East 86th NYC“.
- European private collection.
After 200 years of self-imposed political
and consequently cultural isolation, Japan
re-opened to the West in the course of
the 19th century. For Japan’s art, this me-
ant that it was confronted with Western
art, which was totally unknown to them
and also very different from the artistic
traditions of Japan. At first, this cultural
opening led Japanese artists to imitate
occidental art, which in their eyes had no
negative connotation and was common
practice. It was shortly after the Second
World War that the artist Yoshihara Jiro
declared the independence of Japanese
Contemporary Art. Behind this claim lay,
on the one hand, the encouragement to
create something that had never exis-
ted before, and on the other hand, the
demand to cease all imitations of western
art.
Against this background, in 1954 a group
of artists founded GUTAI, meaning “spon-
taneous, direct, capable of expressing,
without reflexion and immediately, one’s
own thoughts and feelings.” (cit. Barbara
Bertozzi, in: Gutai exhibition catalogue:
Japanese Avant-Garde 1954-1965,
Mathildenhöhe Darmstadt, 24th March –
5th May 1991, p. 20). The first project with
which they made their début was an open-
air exhibition, which in itself was quite revo-
lutionary. But their art was also far-sighted
and alluded to the DADAmovement: it
was composed of happenings, perfor-
mances in which the spectators could take
part, and in which nature was included as
well. All of this took place spontaneously,
in an almost playful manner, without any
concept, which stood in stark contrast to
Japan’s strict, hierarchical society.
The interaction of occidental and oriental
art is immanent; the material used by the
GUTAI artists was to be found later in the
works of Piero Manzoni and the Arte Po-
vera. The impasto, dynamic and abstract
manner of painting shows a close relati-
onship to the European Art Informel as
well as to the American Abstract Expres-
sionism. Although the great Informel art
critic, Michel Tapié, had much influence on
the group through his numerous visits to
Japan, namely with Georges Mathieu, and
remained in close contact with them, the
members of GUTAI nonetheless always
referred to the American Jackson Pollock
as the artist who most influenced their
work. Due to their increasing international
fame, GUTAI’s experimental techniques,
happenings, etc. decreased in favour of oil
painting; the demands of the art market
and innumerable exhibitions, also in Euro-
pe, led to compromises and at the same
time somewhat reduced their creativity.
The admittance of new artists in 1965 rang
up the curtain on a new GUTAI period.
One of the most famous artists of the first
generation is Kazuo Shiraga, who became
an official member of the group in 1955.
In his first happenings, Shiraga takes the
Action-Painting of Jackson Pollock ext-
remely far, creating paintings with his feet
or suspended on straps in order to soar
over the canvas and be able to paint with
his feet.
In the present, small-format work, the
incredible energy with which Shiraga crea-
tes his painting is clear at first sight. The
scattered, pastose surfaces show not only
the dynamics of the work, but also the ex-
pressive and free creative process of the
painting. The scattered, almost waterco-
lour-like colour-fields seem almost to arise
from the canvas. The colour of the canvas
is thus included in the composition; red
dominates the work, but with the black and
blue forms a dense composition.
CHF 70 000 / 100 000
(€ 64 810 / 92 590)