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Masumi Nakaoka:Parapraxis
Events
Written by In the document   
Published: September 21 2012

「fade out」, acrylic, oil, cashew on canvas, 540 × 540mm, 2011

Masumi Nakaoka traces the outlines of landscapes she saw, clips them to make a certain composition applying colors.She uses a variety of medium including cashew (resin), to make even the empty spaces of the painting to contain certain texture of the applied material.In this artist’s painting, a background space normally treated as a background in a picture is given color.On the hand, object which is in the foreground in the real world sometimes turns into an empty white space.This is why Nakaoka’s painting which starts from a representational images changes into abstract landscapes.Her earlier works exhibited at VOCA exhibition in 2007, INAX gallery and Dai-ichi Life Gallery in 2008 had a style like above.The impression of her style was based on creating a large composition of a space especially when creating a large scale painting.These works which objects redefined by colors leaving enough empty white background are surely attractiv e even today.At that time, the pattern is completed as an established style, and I had been seeing works and wondering about her next step.
In her last year\'s exhibition "Towards Gentle Ovals" at Art Front Gallery, she presented completely new style.By using concrete motif like Hiroshima's Atomic bomb dome, perhaps, she consciously started walking toward a new direction that was different from the easy established path she reached before, reconstructing the picture from beautiful landscapes into a different form.
This time, a word "Parapraxis" is used as a subtitle of the exhibition.It is a difficult term which suggests a “wrong reaction based on misunderstanding”.The artist says that the term well describes her current attitude towards her practice.Action like this is a common experience for everyone on a daily basis. For example, a landscape is being painted by a painter.We look at it carefully seeing and thinking that the landscape is representing somewhere in the real world.But in reality, the picture is just a picture which has already departed from the real, and it is made to be appreciated intentionally as an art object.It is impossible contain the real in a picture frame.There is a merely a premise to call the action of artist in art.On the other hand, people tend to see an artwork displayed in an exhibition space, as a window opened in the space looking and seeing them like seeing windows in their own space.
What is remarkable in Nakaoka's recent practice is that she is trying to keep a distance away from a general notion that paintings in the exhibition is representing the real objects and landscapes.Not simply replacing a landscape in her picture, she attempts to give a painting a certain status as an "object" that will be displayed in the exhibition space.In this exhibition, she chose a "garden" that is made artificially, such as a quarry, as her main motif.For example, if there is a bonsai in a garden, it means that a miniature landscape resembling of a picturesque landscape is placed in an artificial garden.This suggests that there is a miniature landscape in a real landscape of a garden.In this exhibition, we start from an understanding the exhibition space is in itself an artificial space, and like placing bonsai in an artificial garden, we will exhibit Nakaoka\'s artificial landscapes in our artificial space.By reconstructing spaces using pictu res, this exhibition challenges to show the artificial landscape of the painting arranged in our artificial space.
In the exhibitions at VOCA in 2007 as well as Art Front Gallery in 2009, her paintings were already established enough to reconstruct the real landscape, while keeping soft colors and empty spaces, even to the point which we already were able to recognize what she actually saw.It was already hard to call her landscape as a representative of the original landscape.We even had no necessity to imagine or compare her landscape with what she actually saw.Her works established brilliantly as a plane surface which can only be accepted instinctively for viewers.
There was a sign of a change in last autumn exhibition.I was surprised to see great change of her new work style such as a painting that can be read a specific motif like a window.Freshness which is one of her work characteristics stays, but we were able to see that she focused on hard subjects like mold blocks for slope protection and stone pits through work titles.These choices of the subject of paintings describe the artist's originality.We were able to see the artist's working process that has been hidden, and we are able to read her works by comparing to the reality we already know.The relationship between the artist and viewers has been changing through the recent exhibitions.
In this exhibition, we give themes in each exhibition space.I believe the exhibition will be a big step forward for this artist to start a new step toward the new horizon.

Toshio Kondo, Art Front Gallery

Opening Reception  September 14 (fri) 18.00 - 20.00
Artist appears the gallery :   Sep 14(Fri), until afternoon on 15(Sat)


全文提供:ART FRONT GALLERY
会期:September 14 (Fri) - September 30 (Sun)
時間:11:00~19:00
closed on Monday
会場:ART FRONT GALLERY
Last Updated on September 14 2012
 

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