{"id":2477,"date":"2018-12-07T14:30:08","date_gmt":"2018-12-07T05:30:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/realtokyo.co.jp\/_sys2024\/en\/?p=2477"},"modified":"2018-12-07T14:30:08","modified_gmt":"2018-12-07T05:30:08","slug":"tadanori-yokoo-exhibition-september-2018-10-5-2018-10-20-ginza-graphic-gallery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/realtokyo.co.jp\/en\/exhibition\/tadanori-yokoo-exhibition-september-2018-10-5-2018-10-20-ginza-graphic-gallery\/","title":{"rendered":"Tadanori Yokoo Exhibition
2018.9.5 – 2018.10.20. ginza graphic gallery (ggg) <\/small>"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\u00a0Copying the universe itself<\/b><\/p>\n

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TheTadanori Yokoo Exhibition reportedly attracted more than 12,000 visitors. While this number alone is already quite intimidating, the exhibition itself was an even more marvelous affair.<\/p>\n

Jakucho Setouchi\u2019s novel Genga\u00a0<\/em>that was serially published in the Tokyo Shimbun\u00a0<\/em>newspaper tells the story of the Ashikaga family and related individuals in the Muromachi period. While based on historical facts, the story unfolds in a fantasy world that is entirely the product of Setouchi\u2019s own imagination. Presented in this exhibition were original illustrations that Yokoo made for this series over a period of more than a year.<\/p>\n

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photograph by Mistumasa Fujitsuka<\/p>\n

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The exhibition spaces on the two floors of the ggg gallery were arranged like mazes, in which a total of 371 small, 8x14cm sized drawings were arranged in 3-5 rows in the style of secret documents, illuminated by little spotlights. The works were surrounded by mats that kept the individual pictures from being interfered, allowing the visitor to fix on every single item undisturbed and from close range. Many of the drawings feature typical Muromachi era motifs from the realms of aristocratic culture and Buddhism, but there was in fact much more than that. Here the drawing vocabulary of Yokoo\u2019s world explodes in a kaleidoscopic fashion.<\/p>\n

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photograph by Mistumasa Fujitsuka<\/p>\n

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There were a variety of highlights in this exhibition. In the 1970s, Yokoo had already developed a strong interest in the spiritual world, and began to travel to India on a regular basis, which he also continued during the time he made these serial illustrations. Before leaving, he even finished illustrations for the as-yet unfinished novel, which, as Setouchi recalls, contained everything from UFOs to sceneries and events seen in a state of meditation. Yokoo\u2019s drawing vocabulary further expanded to incorporate outer space, minerals, animals and plants, and views of life and death.<\/p>\n

Yu Hayashi, curator at the Yokoo Tadanori Museum of Contemporary Art, identifies in the exhibition catalogue the habit of \u201ccopying\u201d from anything ranging from old Japanese books and picture scrolls to movie stills and global art history as the origin of Yokoo\u2019s artistic work, and Midori Wakakuwa, whose essay was included in the catalogue of the \u201cTADANORI YOKOO: All Things in the Universe” exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo in 2002, refers to \u201dintertextuality\u201d as the fundamental principle behind Yokoo\u2019s creative style. While these are indeed valuable theories for a satisfying interpretation of his work as a painter, even before the time of his so-called \u201dpainter declaration\u201d it was the act of \u201ccopying\u201d from the universe, natural phenomena, biology and ecology, to various art historical occurrences that formed the basis of Yokoo\u2019s art. His manifestation of the \u201cvisible world\u201d is in a way a practice of drawing a cosmography, and all of this he applied in his illustrations for this period novel.<\/p>\n

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The question that remains is how he acquired all those objects to be \u201ccopied\u201d in an age 40 years prior to today\u2019s network society. When looking at the enormous amounts of books and pictures piled up in Yokoo\u2019s atelier, it is easy to imagine the artist amidst a treasury of printed information. The depiction of the \u201dDuel at Ganryujima\u201d that he drew at the age of five, is another work that he copied from a picture book in which it was originally printed.<\/p>\n

Translated by Andreas Stuhlmann<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"  \u00a0Copying the universe itself   TheTadanori Yokoo Exhibition reportedly attracted more than 12,000 […]","protected":false},"author":50,"featured_media":2481,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[73],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/realtokyo.co.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2477"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/realtokyo.co.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/realtokyo.co.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/realtokyo.co.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/50"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/realtokyo.co.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2477"}],"version-history":[{"count":18,"href":"https:\/\/realtokyo.co.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2477\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2539,"href":"https:\/\/realtokyo.co.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2477\/revisions\/2539"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/realtokyo.co.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2481"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/realtokyo.co.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2477"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/realtokyo.co.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2477"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/realtokyo.co.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2477"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}