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Tomohiro Kano + Yoshiaki Kojiro Exhibition
Tokyo Gallery + BTAP
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Artists
Tomohiro Kano, Yoshiaki Kojiro
Tomohiro Kano was born in Tokyo in 1958. After graduating from the Wako University’s Department of Fine Arts in Nihonga painting, he worked in a television commercial production company. He began creating glass works in 1986, and in 1995 he established the Kano Glass Studio in Yamanashi, Japan. Since then, he has been experimenting with unique glass manufacturing techniques. His series “Kuuki (Air)” combines glassblowing and casting techniques, and has been acquired by the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo. This exhibition shows Kano’s works that use his previous techniques in new ways, which cast a combination of glass, bricks, and iron. Kano’s work is always conscious of nature. For example, by incorporating organic materials such as earth, stone, and sand, he creates cracks in the glass and incorporates those results as a part of the fabrication process. Kano’s works are also part of the collections at the Shanghai Museum of Glass and Real Fábrica de Cristales de la Granja in Spain.
Yoshiaki Kojiro was born in Chiba in 1968. He received his Bachelor of Engineering in architecture in 1992 and a Master’s degree from the Tokyo University of Science in 1994. He worked in an architecture firm initially, but after becoming fascinated by the process of glassblowing he pursued a career as a glass artist. Using a technique called kiln work, in which glass is fired an electric kiln, he began creating foam glass works. Kojiro has stated that he “wants to follow through and create a structure that is born from material, heat, and gravity,” all the while being aware of the effects of the firing process. His work is an attempt at relating the world to himself. Currently he maintains a studio in Gifu, Japan, and exhibits his work in museums and galleries in Japan and around the world.
The similarity between Kano and Kojiro, neither of whom has a traditional background in craft – and are thereby unbound by its ideals of “beautility” – is the way they use glass as a material. By observing the characteristics of glass in its the liquid state, and the medium’s expansion and shrinkage according to heat in the environment, both artists acknowledge that they themselves are also materials that change according to the environment. What lies at the core of both their practices is an understanding of the pre-modern Japanese perspective of nature. They aim to question the artist’s relationship to materiality, which transcends the divisions between painting, sculpture, and craft that modern art has engendered.
Yoshiaki Kojiro was born in Chiba in 1968. He received his Bachelor of Engineering in architecture in 1992 and a Master’s degree from the Tokyo University of Science in 1994. He worked in an architecture firm initially, but after becoming fascinated by the process of glassblowing he pursued a career as a glass artist. Using a technique called kiln work, in which glass is fired an electric kiln, he began creating foam glass works. Kojiro has stated that he “wants to follow through and create a structure that is born from material, heat, and gravity,” all the while being aware of the effects of the firing process. His work is an attempt at relating the world to himself. Currently he maintains a studio in Gifu, Japan, and exhibits his work in museums and galleries in Japan and around the world.
The similarity between Kano and Kojiro, neither of whom has a traditional background in craft – and are thereby unbound by its ideals of “beautility” – is the way they use glass as a material. By observing the characteristics of glass in its the liquid state, and the medium’s expansion and shrinkage according to heat in the environment, both artists acknowledge that they themselves are also materials that change according to the environment. What lies at the core of both their practices is an understanding of the pre-modern Japanese perspective of nature. They aim to question the artist’s relationship to materiality, which transcends the divisions between painting, sculpture, and craft that modern art has engendered.
Schedule | Jan 21 (Sat) 2017-Feb 18 (Sat) 2017 Opening Hours Information
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| Fee | Free | ||||
| Website | http://www.tokyo-gallery.com/en/exhibitions/intokyo/post-382.html | ||||
| Venue | Tokyo Gallery + BTAP http://www.tokyo-gallery.com/ | ||||
| Location | 7F, 8-10-5 Ginza, Chuo-ku, Tokyo 104-0061 | ||||
| Access | 4 minute walk from the Ginza exit of JR Shimbashi Station. 5 minute walk from exit A3 at Ginza Station on the Ginza, Hibiya and Marunouchi lines. 5 minute walk from exit 5 at Shiodome Station on the Toei Oedo or Yurikamome line. | ||||
| Phone | 03-3571-1808 | ||||
| Related images | Click on the image to enlarge it |
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