Bidou (b.1970) had studied under a Noh-mask carver, GENDOU OGAWA and given his name to be independent. While he was working as a professional Noh-mask carver, Bidou also started searching his own expression rather than keep producing traditional Noh-masks. Bidou found his answer by creating masks of people painted in Western great paintings such as Mona-Lisa and A Girl With a Pearl Earring, and revives their faces as new figures reflecting ever-changing humanity.

He considers face not just as a part of body however as a minimized form of a person’s surroundings. It is also a challenge to convert two-dimensional expressions onto three-dimensional masks. Thus Bidou even expresses its antiquity by carefully coping cracks and scratches of the original painting with a special technique of Noh-mask carving.

By wearing a mask, Noh actor often transforms to supernatural characters such as spirits, demons and ghosts then create a stage of surreal time and space where humans usually cannot be a part. Bidou’s masks also give us a miracle experience of traveling two kinds of culture, Western and Easter, in past and presence.

* The text provided by MEGUMI OGITA GALLERY.

Period: May 10 - 28, 2011
Venue: MEGUMI OGITA GALLERY
Reception: Tuesday, May 10, 2011, 17:30 - 19:30