In 1988, the Goethe-Institut Osaka announced a special initiative which sent art high into the sky: one hundred of the most renowned artists of the time were invited to paint a traditional Japanese flying kite, including Gutai members Atsuko Tanaka and Kazuo Shiraga. Shiraga opted for the ‘Tosa’ kite, a form which is common to the Shikoku region. As the name suggests, Flight of Fancy is capable of climbing into the sky – and liberating the artist’s creation from the classical presentation of a canvas hanging on a wall. This was very much in keeping with Gutai principles. The group were responsible for spectacular events in public spaces, large-scale experiments with colour and material, anticipating the concepts of Happenings and Performance Art long before they entered the art canon.
Kazuo Shiraga (1924–2008)
Höhenflug, 1987/88
Currently exhibited: Yes (Gallery: From Zero to Action)
Material: Japanese ink and acrylic on Japanese paper, mounted on silk
Size: 214.5 x 214.5 x 6.5 cm
Inv-Nr.: B_551
Keywords:
Acquisition: Reinhard Ernst Collection, Nagel Auktionen GmbH, 2022
In 1988, the Goethe-Institut Osaka announced a special initiative which sent art high into the sky: one hundred of the most renowned artists of the time were invited to paint a traditional Japanese flying kite, including Gutai members Atsuko Tanaka and Kazuo Shiraga. Shiraga opted for the ‘Tosa’ kite, a form which is common to the Shikoku region – a square standing on its tip with bamboo poles on the back that can be folded away for transport, making the surface foldable. It is made of ‘washi’, traditional Japanese paper, particularly tear-resistant and at the same time absorbent. As the name suggests, Flight of Fancy is capable of climbing into the sky – and liberating the artist’s creation from the classical presentation of a canvas hanging on a wall.
The spontaneous and expressive use of acrylic paint and ink stems from Shiraga’s special technique of applying paint. Typically, he painted his often large-scale pictures with his feet, sometimes hanging from ropes, in direct physical contact with the picture. This means the body became the painting tool, as can be derived from the characters in the group name Gutai: ‘Gu’ as tool and ‘tai’ as body. The combination ‘Gutai’ can also be translated as ‘concrete’. The group were responsible for spectacular events in public spaces, large-scale experiments with colour and material, anticipating the concepts of Happenings and Performance Art long before they entered the art canon.
Kazuo Shiraga was one of the founding members of the group ZERO-kai, which only merged with Gutai in 1955. He shot to fame in October 1955 with his action Challenging Mud at the first Gutai exhibition in Tokyo, in which he rolled in mud and thus let his body become a brush. In post-war Japan, this was a revolutionary act – the reference to the individual, the sensual body (nikutai) was a rejection of the fascist ideologised collective body (kokutai) invoked as a national polity during the Second World War.
