2021.05.28・
The dramatic growth process of insects, from larva to pupa to adult, is called a “complete metamorphosis.” It is a wonderful process, a successful survival tactic for recreating a brand-new self and embarking on the quest for a new place.
In an age when we can gather, select, and disseminate information on our own, what will be our emerging values? They will be values realized through mutual understanding and dialogue among disparate sensibilities.This joint project with UGO is a complete metamorphosis of preconceived ideas into new and invaluable experiences.
Sezon Museum of Modern Art
UGO is a diverse community of artists, curators, and people working outside the domain of art to collaborate on exhibits, events, seminars, and workshops.
In this joint project, individual UGO members have given free rein to their ideas to craft a range of workshops and other activities that Takao Tsutsumi, director of the Sezon Museum of Modern Art, has likened to the process of an insect’s metamorphosis.
Whether larvae or pupae, there is no denying that UGO is still an immature community. Despite our occasional vulnerabilities, however, we also have the flexibility to transform ourselves in an unpredictable world. Each element of this project reflects the objectives and ideas of its creator. We invite you to join us in a diverse range of learning and thinking experiences brought to you by our members.
UGO
https://www.shinokubo-ugo.com
UGO is a new community space that was built in an old 60-year old apartment complex in Shinokubo. Artists Dan ISOMURA, Rintaro UNNO, Michelle Ceja, Ching Chuan Kou, Michael Rikio Ming Hee Ho, Nanan Furuya, Sareena Sattapon, Moeka Sakuma, Kensho TAMBARA, Ippei HAYASHI, Panipanipanipani TOMOCHINPA, Karu MIYOSHI and Elliott Jun Wright. are UGO. We are a collective of artists/creators that promote diversity and social inclusivity through the power of art. Shinokubo UGO, our base that opened in March 2020, is a multi-use space that is also a gallery, bar, studio, accomodation,and community center. Due to the COVID-19 situation, the accomodation program is postponed until further notice.
2020.03.24・
Now being used as a common word after been used as a slogan for environmental and human rights issues, the word “Symbiosis” was originally used in the field of Biology. This word “Symbiosis” became widely known has a lot to due from architect, Kisho Kurokawa, who has been putting forward the “The Philosophy of Symbiosis” since the 1970s. Being trained by Fumihiko Maki who was part of a project that originated in Japan called “Metabolism” with Kurokawa, Norihiko Dan who is active in both Japan and abroad will curate this exhibition.
Dan was inaugurated as the master architect who proposes the future and the natural environment of Karuizawa since 2020; with the architecture being pointed out as the “Symbiosis with nature” as its characteristic. For this exhibition, in addition to works and image data related to Dan’s “Symbiosis”, Eiji Okubo who has been collaborating with Dan in various projects as an artist will exhibit his newest installation. Moreover, in the section titled “Symbiotic Society”, Takao Tsutsumi（director of Sezon Museum of Modern Art） will be in-charge of the curation alongside with book artist Yasutomo Ota and Dan Isomura, who faces social issues with his own viewpoint being introduced. Through artworks, related materials, and various exhibitions, the “Symbiosis” of the Japanese nature-perspective and the cityscape interpreted by Norihiko Dan will be attempted.
2019.08.02・
Work by Koseki Ono and Mitsumasa Kadota is pervaded with colour. It springs from the artists’ bodies, but goes far beyond even what the artists themselves intended.
Koseki Ono pursues a special brand of printing using numerous layers of ink, imposed in multiple impressions. This imparts changing colours reminiscent of flowers blooming in profusion. Depths and gradations are like those of a three-dimensional tableau. The sight of an animal skull, for example, or a cicada shell, proliferates with pigment and will stimulate viewers’ tactile as well as visual sense.
Mitsumasa Kadota challenges existing definitions of colour and pigment. He has recently also taken up the neutral range of the Japanese traditional palette, such as sekichiku(Chinese pink) and asagi(pale indigo). Picture planes have a newly-developed pearly hue, emitting a gentle radiance and giving the sense of craft objects. As an artist, he pursues the uniquely Japanese expressions.
The ENGINE is an exhibition on the theme of driving forces in creation. It investigates what emerges from the artists themselves and which cannot be captured by existing formats and techniques. The exhibition shows work by two artists, displayed alongside pieces from the Sezon Museum of Modern Art’s own collection. It explores ‘engines’ that ignite creative work, and the key of ‘colour’. This exhibition will liberate the mind and invite viewers from the concept of each work, into wider and unknown sensations.
2019.08.02・
Having developedSeibu Department Stores, Seiyu supermarkets, Parco, FamilyMart, Seibu Credit, Muji, Yoshinoya, and other companies into leading businesses in the foods and consumer goods industries, Seiji Tsutsumi (1927-2013) is known as a revolutionary manager of his time.
At the same time, he produced many award-winning works as a poet and author under the name Takashi Tsujii, including the Muro Saisei Poet Prize-winning Ihojin(Foreigner), Gunjo, Waga Mokushi(Ultramarine, My Revelation) (Takami Jun Prize), the long poem Watatsumi Sanbusaku(Watatsumi Trilogy) (Shimazaki Toson Memorial-Rekitei Award), the novel A Spring Like Any Other(Hirabayashi Taiko Prize), Niji no Misaki(Rainbow Cape) (Tanizaki Junichiro Prize), Shizumeru Shiro(Sinking Castle) (Shinran Prize), and Chichi no Shozo(Portrait of My Father) (Noma Literary Prize).
Opened in Karuizawa in 1981, the Sezon Museum of Modern Art goes beyond distinctions such as manager, poet, or author, and should truly be described as a collaboration between Seiji Tsutsumi and Takashi Tsujii. The reference in the Museum’s opening declaration to a “physical base for the spirit of the times” is widely known as reflecting the thought and sensibility of Seiji Tsutsumi and Takashi Tsujii. November 25, 2019, will mark the sixth anniversary of the death of Seiji Tsutsumi/Takashi Tsujii, and this exhibition takes a look at the world that he created through a collection of artworks that he loved, his literary works and manuscripts by his own hand, cherished belongings, as well as the works and valuable materials of artists with whom he interacted.
2018.07.10・
Sezon Museum of Modern Art is pleased to announce the exhibition “Layers of nature —— Beyond the Line” beginning on April, 2018.
This exhibition will be showing: Shingo Francis, an internationally active artist who sets base in Japan and America. Christian Awe, an artist from Berlin, marking his first exposure in a Japanese museum. Sam Francis, one of the most influential abstract artists in America during the 20th century. It will be a group exhibition of these three artists.
Shingo Francis captures the natural colors and light into his artworks by coming and going between America and Japan, like if it piles up with our layers of memories sleeping within us, the depth becomes deeper each time it is seen. Moreover, the line that is drawn straight like a horizon makes the boundary of the inner and the outer of the painting vague by the intercourse of the unique colors. What is more, he is going to show new work for this exhibition.
Christian Awe brings the fundamental figure which is discovered using various techniques, as the artist states that, “Even when painting something figurative, it starts turning into abstract.” Regarding his new work, he creates multi-tiered space in the painting with the droplets which blurs the boundaries between reality and imagination and is complemented by expressive “splashes of color,” covering the layers below them in rivulets or with apparently spontaneous gestures.
And Sam Francis, father of Shingo Francis and the master of abstract art, the colors painted using the artist’s entire body lives inside the works. Giving color to something invisible, the contrast of colors spreads out infinitely, like if it is giving birth to a new ecosystem in a white land.
If we were to call color, light, space, time, various life-forms, including those invisible things surrounding us “Nature”, their works like that nature enfolds our body. At that time, going beyond the lines drawing the outline of the individual, abstract and figurative, and the boundaries of the viewer and object, we will be feeling that our own selves too are part of the layers configuring the nature.
＜Events＞
・Workshop in Sezon Museum of Modern Art
LIGHT , COLOR , ACTION – painting experience with Christian Awe and Shingo Francis
Date: August 11, 2018 10:30am-12:00pm
Capacity: 10 pairs (child & adult/ about 20 people in total)
Age: the1st glade – the 3rd glade of elementary school (6-10years) / with an adult
Free (An exhibition ticket is required.)
Application: 1. name 2. number of people 3.Tel No./ Email/ Fax No.
＊Please apply to TEL:03-5579-9725 FAX: 03-5579-9726
・ARTIST TALK in Sezon Museum Modern Art / Shingo Francis & Christian Awe
Moderator : Roger McDonald (Director and Curator of AIT/Arts Initiative Tokyo)
Date: August 11, 2018 2:00pm−
Capacity: 30 people
Free（An exhibition ticket is required.）
◆ Collection gallery is available with a ticket of this Exhibition.
