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Lot Essay
VISUALIZATION OF ENERGY
'Avant-garde art thus revolutionizes the perspective of what beauty means, and at the same time shows what human existence is like'. 1 –
Shozo Shimamoto
Active in Japan and international art scene since the 1950s, Shozo Shimamoto is one of the founding members of avant-garde art group, Gutai Art Association. His and unique working method on Whirlpool (fig. 1) and Bottle Crash performance (fig. 2) demonstrated his pioneer position in contemporary art. His art philosophy is closely related to the existence of human and material. Going beyond visual experience, Shimamoto overthrows traditional creating method. His artwork is recognized and housed by Tate Modern Museum in the UK. Besides the Gutai Art Association in Japan, groups of artists in other parts of the world were trying to bring new vitality to painting in the 1960s, including Art Informel, CoBrA and Arte Povera in Europe, and Abstract Expressionism in the USA. Shimamoto's art philosophy derives from his complete focus on humanity's heaven-sent senses, feelings and energy. Graduating from the Philosophy Department of Kansai Gakuin University, in 1954, Shimamoto, together with Jiro Yoshihara and 18 other artists, established an avant-garde group called the "Gutai Art Association". Shimamoto named this association "Gutai." "Gutai is the name made up from two ideograms, the first of which means 'implement', and the second, tai, means 'body/form'. The link between matter and the body is the energy that passes through it: life." 2 From the end of the 1950s, Shimamoto developed the art performance "Bottle Crash" which combined human energy with avant-garde art, but which was also pioneering post-war "action art", and proposed a constant expansion of the "artistic experience."
Visualization And Manifestation Of Energy
The natural world has a life, and energy is the reason Earth has life and growth. What is energy? The nature of light, heat, wind, hydroand kinetic energy, and gravity: whether visible or invisible, these are all energy performing. However, what causes people to feel energy the most is a person's breath, and feelings such as touch, exhalation, sweat, tears, sound, smell, taste, pain and exhaustion - these are all proofs of human existence. The art performance "Bottle Crash" is a manifestation of energy, including Shimamoto's own kinetic energy, acoustic energy, and free will (Fig. 3). Shimamoto's kinetic energy, via his arms, uses glass bottles or plastic cups filled with liquid pigment and thrown in the air, and this liquid pigment combines with Shimamoto's energy. In this empty space (Fig. 4), the liquid pigment has a "time" (the interval between when the bottle is thrown and when it lands), and "space" (the distance between the point from which the bottle is thrown and the canvas, which opens up another independent life. When Shimamoto finishes a performance he is tired, and this attests to the transfer and depletion of energy.
Effects that a brush cannot express
'I believe that the first thing to do is free colour from the paintbrush,' he wrote. 'If in the process of creating the paintbrush isn't cast aside, there is no hope of emancipating the tones.' 3 'I think the throwing of bottles as a method of painting is a form of study of the unknown,' Shimamoto once said. 'More than anything else, I find stimulation in the materialization of an unpredictable expression.' 4 Canvas spread out on the ground records energy, including the artist's spiritual energy, kinetic energy, and gravity. In Untitled (Lot 463) and Untitled (Lot 464) the bloom of vitality and energy splays out in all directions, with splashes of red, white, dark green, mud yellow, blue and pink-coloured paint. The canvas captures the speed of the paint's flow, its direction and strength. The texture that appears on the canvas, with such details as elongated drip effects, spots that spray out, and the heavy accumulation of pigments, is formed by Shimamoto throwing the paint in different ways. The two works challenge traditional pictorial space, composition, colour and lighting. Impressions from rubbing, drips, scratches, broken glass bonding to paint, etc. the semi-automatically entangled vortex colour, these incidental visual effects are rendered in ways a brush cannot express. It reflects the philosophy that emphasizes "truth to material" and "the creative process" that, according to Clement Greenberg, typifies all modern art: "the inherent aesthetic qualities of painting grew directly out of the materials and processes of painting itself." 5 Since the 1950s, Art is in transition from a focus on developing image esthetics to expressing the subconscious and emotions that the naked eye cannot see. Shimamoto thereby enters into investigations of the energy reflected in and recorded by his artistic method to subvert convention, and show the meaning of human existence. Art thus expresses the image of the invisible and emotional. And Shimamoto, by embodying energy and its recording, has reversed the conventional method of artistic creation by performing the meaning of human existence. public to take part in art by breaking the highend image of art.
1 Gabriella Dalesio, '5th Chaos, Ugly is beautiful', Shozo Shimamoto, Between East and West-Life, the Substance of Art, editioni Morra, Napel, Italy, 2014, p. 115.
2 Gabriella Dalesio, 'Introduction', Shozo Shimamoto, Between East and West-Life, the Substance of Art, editioni Morra, Napel, Italy, 2014, pp. 10-11.
3 Shozo Shimamoto, The Execution of Paintbrushes, Gutai Osaka, 1 April 1957.
4 Bonito Oliva, Achille, Shimamoto Shōzō, Samurai, acrobata dello sguardo 1950-2008 (exh. cat.), Genova: Museo d'Arte Contemporanea di Villa Croce, organized by ABC-ARTE, Milan: Skira, 2008, P.26.
5. Jeffrey Wechsler, 'From Asian Traditions to Modern Expressions: Asian American Artists and Abstraction, 1945-1970', Asian Traditions/Modern Expressions: Asian American Artists and Abstraction, 1945-1970, Harry N. Abrams, New York, 1997, p. 78.
'Avant-garde art thus revolutionizes the perspective of what beauty means, and at the same time shows what human existence is like'. 1 –
Shozo Shimamoto
Active in Japan and international art scene since the 1950s, Shozo Shimamoto is one of the founding members of avant-garde art group, Gutai Art Association. His and unique working method on Whirlpool (fig. 1) and Bottle Crash performance (fig. 2) demonstrated his pioneer position in contemporary art. His art philosophy is closely related to the existence of human and material. Going beyond visual experience, Shimamoto overthrows traditional creating method. His artwork is recognized and housed by Tate Modern Museum in the UK. Besides the Gutai Art Association in Japan, groups of artists in other parts of the world were trying to bring new vitality to painting in the 1960s, including Art Informel, CoBrA and Arte Povera in Europe, and Abstract Expressionism in the USA. Shimamoto's art philosophy derives from his complete focus on humanity's heaven-sent senses, feelings and energy. Graduating from the Philosophy Department of Kansai Gakuin University, in 1954, Shimamoto, together with Jiro Yoshihara and 18 other artists, established an avant-garde group called the "Gutai Art Association". Shimamoto named this association "Gutai." "Gutai is the name made up from two ideograms, the first of which means 'implement', and the second, tai, means 'body/form'. The link between matter and the body is the energy that passes through it: life." 2 From the end of the 1950s, Shimamoto developed the art performance "Bottle Crash" which combined human energy with avant-garde art, but which was also pioneering post-war "action art", and proposed a constant expansion of the "artistic experience."
Visualization And Manifestation Of Energy
The natural world has a life, and energy is the reason Earth has life and growth. What is energy? The nature of light, heat, wind, hydroand kinetic energy, and gravity: whether visible or invisible, these are all energy performing. However, what causes people to feel energy the most is a person's breath, and feelings such as touch, exhalation, sweat, tears, sound, smell, taste, pain and exhaustion - these are all proofs of human existence. The art performance "Bottle Crash" is a manifestation of energy, including Shimamoto's own kinetic energy, acoustic energy, and free will (Fig. 3). Shimamoto's kinetic energy, via his arms, uses glass bottles or plastic cups filled with liquid pigment and thrown in the air, and this liquid pigment combines with Shimamoto's energy. In this empty space (Fig. 4), the liquid pigment has a "time" (the interval between when the bottle is thrown and when it lands), and "space" (the distance between the point from which the bottle is thrown and the canvas, which opens up another independent life. When Shimamoto finishes a performance he is tired, and this attests to the transfer and depletion of energy.
Effects that a brush cannot express
'I believe that the first thing to do is free colour from the paintbrush,' he wrote. 'If in the process of creating the paintbrush isn't cast aside, there is no hope of emancipating the tones.' 3 'I think the throwing of bottles as a method of painting is a form of study of the unknown,' Shimamoto once said. 'More than anything else, I find stimulation in the materialization of an unpredictable expression.' 4 Canvas spread out on the ground records energy, including the artist's spiritual energy, kinetic energy, and gravity. In Untitled (Lot 463) and Untitled (Lot 464) the bloom of vitality and energy splays out in all directions, with splashes of red, white, dark green, mud yellow, blue and pink-coloured paint. The canvas captures the speed of the paint's flow, its direction and strength. The texture that appears on the canvas, with such details as elongated drip effects, spots that spray out, and the heavy accumulation of pigments, is formed by Shimamoto throwing the paint in different ways. The two works challenge traditional pictorial space, composition, colour and lighting. Impressions from rubbing, drips, scratches, broken glass bonding to paint, etc. the semi-automatically entangled vortex colour, these incidental visual effects are rendered in ways a brush cannot express. It reflects the philosophy that emphasizes "truth to material" and "the creative process" that, according to Clement Greenberg, typifies all modern art: "the inherent aesthetic qualities of painting grew directly out of the materials and processes of painting itself." 5 Since the 1950s, Art is in transition from a focus on developing image esthetics to expressing the subconscious and emotions that the naked eye cannot see. Shimamoto thereby enters into investigations of the energy reflected in and recorded by his artistic method to subvert convention, and show the meaning of human existence. Art thus expresses the image of the invisible and emotional. And Shimamoto, by embodying energy and its recording, has reversed the conventional method of artistic creation by performing the meaning of human existence. public to take part in art by breaking the highend image of art.
1 Gabriella Dalesio, '5th Chaos, Ugly is beautiful', Shozo Shimamoto, Between East and West-Life, the Substance of Art, editioni Morra, Napel, Italy, 2014, p. 115.
2 Gabriella Dalesio, 'Introduction', Shozo Shimamoto, Between East and West-Life, the Substance of Art, editioni Morra, Napel, Italy, 2014, pp. 10-11.
3 Shozo Shimamoto, The Execution of Paintbrushes, Gutai Osaka, 1 April 1957.
4 Bonito Oliva, Achille, Shimamoto Shōzō, Samurai, acrobata dello sguardo 1950-2008 (exh. cat.), Genova: Museo d'Arte Contemporanea di Villa Croce, organized by ABC-ARTE, Milan: Skira, 2008, P.26.
5. Jeffrey Wechsler, 'From Asian Traditions to Modern Expressions: Asian American Artists and Abstraction, 1945-1970', Asian Traditions/Modern Expressions: Asian American Artists and Abstraction, 1945-1970, Harry N. Abrams, New York, 1997, p. 78.