ART FAIR TOKYO 2024｜MEGUMI OGITA GALLERY

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ART FAIR TOKYO

Gary Baseman

Yoshimasa Tsuchiya

Fukuo Tanaka

Hebru Brantley

Dates

March 8-10, 2024

11am-7pm

*Until 5pm on March 10

Contact

info@megumiogita.com

Tokyo International Forum, Hall E

Booth N005

3 Chome-5-1 Marunouchi, Chiyoda, Tokyo 100-0005 Japan

Gary Baseman Commentary on Works

Gary Baseman is an interdisciplinary artist who investigates history, heritage, and the human condition (especially love, longing, and loss). Through unique iconography and fantastical visual narratives that celebrate “the beauty of the bittersweetness of life,” his work brings together the worlds of popular culture and fine art. Baseman (b. 1960) was born and raised in Los Angeles, California when lifestyles dramatically shifted and politics and popular culture seeped into the home. The influence of media and Hollywood, blended with LA’s influential art scene, led to how Baseman would perceive and produce art. Baseman witnessed how artists challenged traditional art practices and crossed boundaries, and would later coin the term “Pervasive Art” to reflect his multifaceted creative output much like his predecessors and admired artists who also resisted the confines of media, styles, purposes, and audiences. Baseman transforms everyday observations and experiences into art that includes drawing, painting, photography, video, installation art, performance, as well as fashion, toy design and social media.

Gary Baseman, Pied Piper of Pollen, 2022, 17.8 x 12.8 cm, Colored pencil on paper

Yoshimasa Tsuchiya was born in 1977 and specialised in sculpture at Tokyo University of the Arts, and completed PhD, Sculpture Conservation at the postgraduate school in 2007. Tsuchiya has established the unique painting method, in which light colours appear faintly inside from the white surface of wood carving. He also uses techniques used in Buddhist statues, whereby the head is split open and stone or glass eyes are inserted, to create works with a mysterious look. The glass eye is produced by artist Fukuo Tanaka. At first glance, the work is instantly recognisable as Tsuchiya’s, and can be described as “the latest classics” with timeless originality and the power to appeal to both the present and the future. Tsuchiya’s motifs are animals as symbols, which embody intangible ideas in the shape of living creatures. The images of animals that appear in myths and tales are the origin of his ideas, and the creatures born from them have repeatedly mutated and cross-bred, taking the inspiration from improved garden plants and ornamental fish, and have developed into a variety of forms.

Yoshimasa Tsuchiya, Boy, 2024, 44 x 33 x 29 cm, Painted camphor wood, borosilicate glass by Fukuo Tanaka

Fukuo Tanaka works with highly transparent, heat-resistant borosilicate glass. After studying at a glass art school, he presents his work under the brand name “Topnoch”. In Yoshimasa Tsuchiya’s solo exhibition “Phylogenesis” in 2022, he was in charge of the gazing glass eyes with the white, iris and pupil for Tsuchiya’s wood carvings. Tanaka uses a technique called “inside-out” to create dainty, delicate works at will. He uses a burner to heat pieces of glass in dots, on the outside of a glass stick, which changes into various patterns as it melts inside, creating a microcosm whilst shaping the whole. The unique colours are created by heating coloured glass and vaporised metals such as pure gold and silver, and combining them by chemical reaction. The works are reminiscent of natural and universal beauty, such as snow crystals and leaf veins, which exist in the world according to certain laws without intervention of human hands.

Fukuo Tanaka, Fragrance, 2024, φ5.35 cm, Borosilicate glass, gold

Hebru Brantley was born in Chicago and currently lives and works in Los Angeles. Brantley earned a B.A. in Film from Clark Atlanta University and has a background in Design and Media Illustration. Brantley creates narrative-driven work revolving around his conceptualized iconic characters which are utilized to address complex ideas around nostalgia, the mental psyche, power, and hope. The color palettes, pop-art motifs, and characters themselves create accessibility around Brantley’s layered and multifaceted beliefs. Majorly influenced by the South Side of Chicago’s AfriCOBRA movement in the 1960s and 70s, Brantley uses the lineage of mural work as a frame to explore his inquiries, applying a plethora of mediums from oil, acrylic, watercolor and spray paint to non-traditional mediums such as coffee and tea. Brantley’s work challenges the traditional view of the hero or protagonist and his work insists on a contemporary and distinct narrative that shapes and impacts the viewer’s gaze.

Hebru Brantley, Bombastic Side Eye (Still), 2024, Image size 60 x 60 cm, Paper size 72 x 72 cm, Silkscreen, gold leaf on paper

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