Skip to content

FM Forward

Menu 日本語 中文
  • Featured
    • Anna Conway
    • Barney, Schneemann, Shiraga, Tanaka
    • Barry X Ball
    • Barbarian Days
    • Jasper Johns: Eyes in the Persistence of Form
    • Kathleen Jacobs
    • Kazuo Shiraga
    • Leiko Ikemura: Anima Alma – Works 1981 – 2022
    • Marcia Hafif
    • Marcia Hafif: Change and Continuity 1962 – 1974
    • Martha Jungwirth
    • Sadamasa Motonaga A Centennial Celebration: Triangle Circle Square
    • Noriyuki Haraguchi
    • Rita Ackermann & Andro Wekua: Chapter 4
    • Richard Nonas
    • Richard Serra
    • Seven/Seven: The Fraught Landscape-EG
    • Tatsuo Ikeda
    • Tatsuo Ikeda-Brahman
  • 作家一覧
    • 池田龍雄
    • 池田龍雄-BRAHMAN
    • キャスリーン・ジェイコブス
    • ジャスパー・ジョーンズ: Eyes in the Persistence of Form
    • 白髪一雄
    • バーニー、シュニーマン、白髪、田中
    • マーシャ・ハフィフ: Change and Continuity 1962 – 1974-jp
    • 元永定正生誕100周年記念展:さんかくまるしかく
    • リチャード・セラ
    • リタ・アッカーマン & アンドロ・ウェクア
    • Seven/Seven: The Fraught Landscape-JP
  • 参展艺术家
  • FM Virtual
  • Contact

 

豪傑シリーズ

 

 

 

 

 

 

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Born in Amagasaki, Japan, in 1924, Shiraga co-founded the Zero Group (Zero-kai) with Saburō Murakami and Akira Kanayama in 1952. In 1955, he joined the legendary collective, Gutai Art Association, and made a series of revolutionary works that the art historian Reiko Tomii calls “performance paintings,” including Challenging Mud (1955), in which he wrestled with several tons of mud, and Red Logs (1955), a structure made of wood logs that Shiraga hacked into with an ax. His distinct and inimitable style of foot painting emerged the year before, in 1954.

Aware of Jackson Pollock since 1951, Shiraga—like his western contemporaries Robert Rauschenberg, Cy Twombly, and Yves Klein—sought to create work that moved beyond the vocabulary of Abstract Expressionism. He succeeded in creating paintings of great innovation with his unique style, which involved sliding, spinning, and swirling his feet in mounds of oil paint on large sheets of paper and canvas laid on the floor while clinging to a rope suspended from the ceiling. By the time of his 1957 “performance painting” on-stage, Sanbasō-Super Modern, Shiraga was among the most avant-garde artists of his time, and his work was drawing international attention.

Shiraga’s work was first introduced to the American public under the auspices of a Gutai exhibition held at Martha Jackson Gallery, New York, in September 1958. His work was dismissed as derivative and his great originality went unrecognized, in what amounted to an extraordinary misreading. However, having realized a means so unmistakably his own, Shiraga continued to refine and rework his signature style for the remainder of his long career, creating challenging paintings of visceral energy and visual power.

Kazuo Shiraga in his studio, 1960 © Estate of Kazuo Shiraga; courtesy Amagasaki Cultural Foundation

The artist’s six-decade career proved enduringly provocative and successful both in Japan and in Europe. Until recently, however, his work was largely overlooked in the United States. It has been included in numerous group exhibitions, including, most recently: Destroy the Picture: Painting the Void, 1949–1962, Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, 2012–13; Tokyo 1955–1970: A New Avant-Garde, Museum of Modern Art, New York, 2012–13; Gutai: Splendid Playground, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, 2013; Gutai, l’espace et le temps, Musée Soulages, Rodez, France, 2018. Solo museum retrospectives have taken place at the Musée d’Art Moderne, Ville de Toulouse, 1993; Hyogo Prefectural Museum of Art, Kobe, 2001; Yokosuka Museum of Art, 2009; Dallas Museum of Art, 2015; Amagasaki Cultural Center, 2018; and Tokyo Opera City Art Gallery, 2020.

Recording: Exhibition Walk-Through with Paul Schimmel & Allan Schwartzman

Editorial

The Openheartendness of Water Marginby Shiraga Kazuo

Since I was a boy, I have been an avid reader of the epic Chinese tale Water Margin. Over the years, I have never known what it is I love about the book, only read and enjoyed the various Japanese translations of this story, full of marvelous characters and their heroic actions amid…
Read more →

随想「水滸伝的豪放」白髪一雄

少年時代から、私の愛読してやまないものに、中国の長編巷談 水滸伝がある。年来何処が好きなのか確かめた事もなく、唯いろいろの邦訳を面白く読んでいるだけであるが、その中国的な雄大な自然の中に豪快な人物が活躍するところ、雲をわかせ、風をおこし実に痛快である。
続きを読む →

《水浒传》中的坦率和白发一雄

自从我是个男孩时,我就是中国经典小说《水浒传》的狂热读者。这么些年,我不知道是什么让我如此热爱这本书,我一直翻阅和享受这个故事的各类日文翻译版本,书里各类潇洒人物和他们的英雄事迹,以及奇幻的中国自然景象,这是叱咤风云的、扣人心弦的风景。
阅读更多 →

Gutai: Kazuo Shiraga

Editorial

Kazuo Shiraga:
Travel Itinerary, China, 1981

It was already feeling like a very long road trip when we finally caught a glimpse of Mt. Tiantai…
Read more →

白髪一雄:
1981年中国旅行日程

「長い長い時間乗っているような気がして、やがて天台山が見えはじめた時は感激と興奮で胸がいっぱいになった…
続きを読む →

白发一
雄《水浒传英雄》系列

当我们终于隐约看到天台山时,已经觉得这是一段十分漫长的旅程,而我的心却充满了喜悦和激动…
阅读更多 →

Kazuo Shiraga: Tales of the Water Margin

Learn More

Fergus McCaffrey


NEW YORK

514 W 26th St
New York NY 10001
+1 212-988-2200
info@fergusmccaffrey.com
FAX: +1 212 988-2250



TOKYO

3-5-0 Kita-Aoyama Minato-ku
Tokyo
+81(0)3-6447-2660
tokyo@fergusmccaffrey.com
FAX: +81(0)3-6447-2686



ST BARTH.

Route de Grand Fond
97133 St Barthélemy
+(590) 690 532 624
stbarth@fergusmccaffrey.com
FAX: +(590) 590 512 290
Copyright © 2023 FM Forward. All Rights Reserved.
Screenr parallax theme by FameThemes