Yayoi Kusama
Dots Obsession 2011
Vinyl balloons, dot sheets, paint, mirrors
Image: Exhibition catalogue
Yayoi Kusama is a Japanese artist whose paintings, sculptures, performances and installations have influenced generations of artists from minimalists in New York to contemporary practitioners the world over. Kusama was born in 1929, in Japan where she studied for one year before moving to New York in 1957/58 (reports differ). At the time New York was living in the shadow of Abstract Expressionism, a movement which had thrust the city to the centre of the art world. Kusama’s influence was to be profound as she defied definition, experimented and captivated everyone with her eccentric persona. In 1973 Kusama returned to Japan and her profiled waned in the US until retrospectives of her work brought her international attention, particularly the 45th Venice Biennale in 1993. During the exhibition she began selling the silver spheres which made up her installation Narcissus Garden for the equivalent of $2. Reuben Keehan, Curator, Contemporary Asian Art, Queensland Art Gallery/Gallery of Modern Art suggests this was clearly a critique of the institutionalisation of contemporary art. This is just one example where her work defies the expectation of genre, audience and authority.
Kusama has been continually influenced by the hallucinations she had as a child in which she was surrounded by colourful dots, flowers and patterns. Kusama’s mental illness is not extensively written of, nor does it need to be. She has an obsessive compulsive disorder. In Japan she chose to live at the Seiwa Hospital in Tokyo. She continues to live there, painting everyday. Her art and her life are inseparable.
An exhibition of Kusama’s recent installation, and well as video and sculpture is on display at the Queensland Art Gallery/Gallery of Modern Art. Her exhibition ‘Look Now, See Forever’ features samples from her diverse output, but is perhaps less indicative of her defiance of genre and authority than earlier exhibitions. This exhibition, however, is highly engaging and sure to excite return visits.
Read more …
Filed under Yayoi Kusama QAGGoMA contemporary art review
Yayoi Kusama - An Introduction. (Via KusamaDocumentary).
An exhibition of Kusama’s work is currently on display at the Queensland Art Gallery/Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane, until 11 March 2012.
Filed under Yayoi Kusama QAGGoMA video
Valentin Palonen
Everyday Alchemy
Mixed media
If you haven’t seen the School of Art Masters exhibition you have sadly missed your chance, it closed on 11 December. You haven’t missed your chance to see some of the works here, however, or to read about them. This is more of a post-review review (holidays and deadlines don’t always mix).
This year’s presentation of the graduating fine artists from the Victorian College of the Arts (VCA) again struck me with its diversity of approaches and fearless exploration of contemporary themes and materials. This was a sprawling exhibition, extending from the Margaret Lawrence Gallery out into the college studios. This year’s show included the usual amount of video art, sculpture, conceptual art, installations of unexpected materials, photography and a small number of textile works.
Read more …
Filed under Victorian College of The arts Pip Ryan Hugh Davis Adele Macer Valentina Palonen Amy Spiers Georgie Roxby Smith Vivienne Allender Mark Friedlander Laura Skerlj
Sir Kenneth Clark on Raphael - The Hero as Artist (episode 5) from the BBC series ‘Civilisation’ (1969).
In this rare video Clark describes how Raphael was received at the time. Though not in favour as he is today Raphael’s significance is noted by Clark who goes into great detail about several of Raphael’s great works.
A brief overview by Nicholas Penny from the Grove Dictionary of Art states:
He has always been acknowledged as one of the greatest European artists. With Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo and Titian, he was one of the most famous painters working in Italy in the period from 1500 to 1520, often identified as the High Renaissance, and in this period he was perhaps the most important figure. His early altarpieces (of 1500–07) were made for Città di Castello and Perugia; in Florence between 1504 and 1508 he created some of his finest portraits and a series of devotional paintings of the Holy Family. In 1508 he moved to Rome, where he decorated in fresco the Stanze of the papal apartments in the Vatican Palace—perhaps his most celebrated works—as well as executing smaller paintings in oil (including portraits) and a series of major altarpieces, some of which were sent from Rome to other centres. In Rome, Raphael came to run a large workshop. He also diversified, working as an architect and designer of prints.
Filed under Sir Kenneth Clark Video Raphael
Emily Floyd, Steiner Rainbow 2006
In this video for the Gallery of Modern Art’s 5th birthday celebrations, Peter McKay, Curator of Contemporary Australian art, speaks about the changing significance of rainbows. Emily Flod’s sculpture draws inspiration from the philosophy of Rudolf Steiner, taking the small wooden sculptures used in Steiner/Waldorf schools and enlarging them. The scale is a little bigger than human, as you can see in the video.
As a Steiner graduate I immediately recognised this sculpture. At school there were many small wooden objects which we all played with, the rainbow was one. This sculpture draws our attention to colour and scale, as well as the relevance of rainbows (which McKay speaks about). Steiner Rainbow is large and imposing, but it also draws you in, irresistibly you have to walk around it. There are many ways this artwork could be displayed, just as when we were kids changing the angles of each colour arc. It’s temping to touch too and while I was in the gallery small children were encouraged not to touch the artwork, though you could tell they really wanted to. (This seems at odds with the intended use for small wooden rainbows but perhaps not contemporary art objects.)
An interview with Emily Floyd is available in the Hiede Museum’s Colour Bazaar: Nine Contemporary Works education resource here. Colour Bazaar was on display 12 February to 19 June 2011.
Filed under Art Emily Floyd QAGGoMA Rudolf Steiner contemporary art video
