MORIMURA Yasumasa, Portraits for the Wild Grass (Study 4), 2023
Morimura Yasumasa Five Characters in a Transformer
Dates: Friday, 19 April ‒ Saturday, 1 June, 2024
Venue: ShugoArts
Hours: 11am – 6pm, Closed on Sun, Mon and Public Holidays
It is not aiming for entertainment,
But it is a fun show.
It does not fall for stories with origins and endings,
But something is being said.
A quiet dissonance bursts forth inward and outward.
Thus, this is a solo five-person exhibition.
Morimura Yasumasa
Morimura Yasumasa continues to engage in a wide variety of fulfilling art practices. In recent years, Morimura has been involved in exhibitions and performances such as Yasumasa Morimura: Ego Obscura, Tokyo 2020 (2020) at the Hara Museum of Contemporary Art , A Gift of the Sea, M-Style Morimura Yasumasaʼs Auto-Mythology (2021-2022) at the Artizon Museum, Shin Kyoeikitan (New Strange Tale of a Mirror Reflection) (2022), a collaboration with a Bunraku puppeteer Kanjuro Kiritake, and My Self-Portraits as a Theater of Labyrinths (2022) at the Kyoto City KYOCERA Museum of Art. In addition, Morimura has organized special exhibitions at M@M (Morimura@Museum) in Kitakagaya, Osaka and installed a public art work at the Osaka University Nakanoshima Art Center. He is also writing a book titled Ikinobirutamenigeijutsuwahitsuyouka, meaning do we need art to survive?, which will be published by Kobunsha this April.
MORIMURA Yasumasa, Want to change the world ? Be seriously unserious (Miró A), 2020
Morimura has been working on the theme of “I” for about 40 years, but what is “Morimura Yasumasa” after all?
In his work, he portrays art historical figures, film actresses and historical figures, and in the real world, he is a photographer, a filmmaker, a writer and a stage performer. It is as if a wide variety of identities are living together in one vessel called Morimura Yasumasa. Morimura rather affirms such “lack of unity, unorganized and scattered, mixing of different characters and values, and not creating a hierarchy,” and states that he would rather avoid “convergence to a fixed identity.”
MORIMURA Yasumasa, Scene with Kafka 2, 2015/2024
Morimura’s latest, previously unexhibited, and recent works, which will be showcased in this exhibition, are composed of five sections (i.e., five characters) that have no relationship to each other, and are developed in their own ways. Morimura is disguised as Tadaoto Kainoshō, Napoleon, Miró’s paintings, Kafka and Lu Xun. In a total of 14 works, the multiple identities of Morimura Yasumasa quietly and joyfully explode with dissonance.
When we identify “I” with something, our thoughts are fixed right then. If we view the self as an interconnection of subjective experiences that is in a constant state of change, the intentionally scattered state of “I” could be the source of creation. We hope you will enjoy Morimura Yasumasa Five Characters in a Transformer.
ShugoArts, February 2024
MORIMURA Yasumasa, Mysterious Illusion of KAINOSHŌ, 2023/2024