Japan Society Showcases Art Inspired By Extreme Textile Making

This fall Japan Society Gallery explores a new art that is emerging from a remarkable fusion of Japanese artisanal and industrial textile-making. Coaxed from materials as age-old as hemp and newly developed as microfilaments, a varied array of more than 35 large-scale works will be on view in Fiber Futures: Japan's Textile Pioneers from Friday, September 16 to Sunday, December 18, 2011.

While the spirit of a Japanese sensibility and a technical virtuosity hewn over centuries is everywhere evident, what best characterizes the work on view is a thirst for experimentation, whether it be in the search for the unconventional material or in the fusing of seemingly opposing extremes of old and new. One also sees the medium of fiber used to express ideas about nature and sustainability and personal and cultural identity.

"These works remind us that important art need not always be about rebellion or subversion," notes Joe Earle, Director of Japan Society Gallery and curator of the exhibition. "For most of the 30 artists represented here, it is the material that tells them what to do next, in the spirit of tariki, originally a Buddhist term meaning the ‘power of another.'"

"The very qualities that are unique to fabric inspire me and my fellow artists to try to move beyond mere technical mastery to create daring and beautiful works of art," says Hiroko Watanabe, a professor at Tama Art University, president of International Textile Network Japan, and an artist represented in Fiber Futures. The exhibition is a juried show, jointly presented by Japan Society and International Textile Network Japan as part of a long-term collaboration with Tama Art University Museum in Tokyo.

Japan Society has commissioned an installation from Kyoko Ibe, one of Japan's most influential paper artists, as part of the exhibition. An ethereal web of indigo-dyed gossamer threads will sway to the breeze and catch and reflect light as it floats above the garden pool in the lobby of the Society's landmarked building. Ibe's other work in the show is a screen made of paper from the 19th century, remnants of ink glowing blue-black-a palimpsest of words once read and lives once lived. Emotion is found in reuse in this highly sophisticated object lesson in sustainability.

Jun'ichi Arai, one of the world's most celebrated textile pioneers, is contributing a show-stopper, a huge, eye-poppingly beautiful filmy gold and silver curtain whose formal simplicity belies extraordinary technical complexity. Of a double-cloth weave-gold on one side, silver on the other-the curtain is made of monofilament "slit film" yarn, ultra-thin strips sliced from polyphenylene sulfide film with a 1/10000 of a millimeter vacuum-deposited aluminum coating. For the silver color, the aluminum was covered with an even thinner layer of clear epoxy resin, and for the gold, the resin was mixed with a yellow dye. Finally, the artist employed a process called "melt-off," which he himself invented, to dissolve the aluminum coating from unprotected areas of the surface.

Yuh Okano, another noted textile designer and artist active in both Japan and New York, will show a brick-hued piece from her "Water" series, pairing the natural (wool) and the synthetic (polyester) to rugged, regal affect. The tireless inventor Reiko Sudo, known for devising "abusive treatments" in the pursuit of unexpected surfaces, presents a new installation work. Fabrication (2011) floats in space, a single piece of fabric fashioned from tightly embroidered "warps" hand-shaped over a metal rod into strips and then sewed together in different combinations.

Sudo's "abuse" of fabric is just one of the extremes to which conventional textile methods are taken-or pushed-in this exhibition. On occasion, the process becomes part of the meaning of the artwork, as in Kazuyo's Onoyama's astonishing Orikata (Folded Form), 2006. Here the artist has taken a thin yellow polyester fabric and folded it over and over as a prayer for, in the artist's words, "happiness, peace, abundance and good health, and as an expression of the close relationship that should exist between human life and our natural environment." (It is a custom in Japan to fold 1,000 paper cranes as a way of praying for recovery from illness.) For Hiroko Watanabe, the challenge was to so saturate a handwoven piece of cotton and metal fiber fabric with scarlet that, in the artist's words, would draw out "the magical power of red." The resulting tufted drop of fabric is tough, dense, difficult, and unforgettable.

For the viewer who encounters Yasuko Iyanaga's bravura application of shibori tie-dyeing on a single piece of spun silk, it may seem as though a gentle breath is animating a giant, curvaceous, and ridge-encrusted sea creature. Other artists as well explore fiber's potential as a sculptural medium to express natural beauty, including Hitomi Nagai, whose large-scale waffle-weave is composed of white warp and weft threads gathered and twisted at regular intervals into an enigmatic honeycomb, and Kyoko Kumai, whose large-scale installation-near-weightless orbs of fine stainless-steel yarn-evokes the sky and the cosmos.

The artists featured in Fiber Futures: Japan's Textile Pioneers are:

Machiko Agano, b. 1953; Mitsuko Akutsu, b. 1952; Jun'ichi Arai, b. 1932; Tomoko Arakawa, b. 1974; Tetsuo Fujimoto, b. 1952; Dai Fujiwara, b.1967; Akio Hamatani, b. 1947; Kyoko Ibe, b. 1941; Kiyomi Iwata, b. 1941; Yasuko Iyanaga, b. 1948; Naomi Kobayashi, b. 1945; Kinya Koyama, b. 1946; Shigeo Kubota, b. 1947; Kyoko Kumai, b. 1943; Akiko Kumazawa, b. 1976; Tetsuo Kusama, b. 1946; Hitomi Nagai, b. 1954; Emiko Nakano, b. 1941; Yuh Okano, b. 1965; Fuminori Ono, b. 1971; Kazuyo Onoyama, b. 1951; Rei Saito, b. 1978; Hisako Sekijima, b. 1944; Naoko Serino, b. 1962; Reiko Sudo, b. 1953; Hideho Tanaka, b. 1942; Takaaki Tanaka, b. 1967; Misao Tsubaki, b. 1941; Hiroko Watanabe, b.1957; Atsuko Yoshioka, b. 1947.

Catalogue

Fiber Futures: Japan's Textile Pioneers, by Joe Earle and Hiroko Watanabe, will be published by Japan Society, New York, and distributed by Yale University Press, New Haven and London. The publication comprehensively documents and illustrates the exhibition it accompanies. (Fiber Futures: Japan's Textile Pioneers will retail in bookstores and online nationwide for $35; $25 when purchased at Japan Society for the duration of the exhibition.)

Related Programming

Symposium: Dissolving Boundaries & Shaping Discourse
Saturday, September 17, 2011, 1:00-4:00 pm
A distinguished roster of speakers address themes vital to artists working with fiber materials including the developing role of technology, with Hiroko Watanabe, Professor Emerita, Tama Art University and President, International Textile Network; Matilda McQuaid, Deputy Curatorial Director and Head of Textiles, Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum; poet, curator, and critic Akira Tatehata, President, Kyoto City University of Arts; and Christy Matson, Assistant Professor, Fiber and Material Studies, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Tickets: $11/$7 Japan Society members, seniors & students (includes exhibition entry).

Family Program: Art Cart: Fiber Futures: Japan's Textile Pioneers
Textile/Text/Texture
Sunday, October 2, 2:00-4:00
Textile artist and arts educator Rachel Miller leads a hands-on multi-step textile project for children and their families visiting Fiber Futures. An interactive gallery lesson introduces tools and techniques used in the production of selected artworks and analyzes formal qualities (line, texture, scale, color, form). Recommended for children ages 8-12. Tickets: $12/$5 Japan Society members.

openhousenewyork
October 15 & 16
Japan Society Gallery offers free admission to Fiber Futures from 11am to 5pm for patrons of the citywide architectural festival openhousenewyork (www.ohny.org). Walk-in exhibition and building tours take place at 11:00 am, 12:30 pm and 2:00 pm.

Lecture: Mastermind in Textile: An Evening with Dai Fujiwara
Wednesday, November 16, 6:30 pm
Dai Fujiwara, former Creative Director of Miyake Design Studio appears in conversation with Cara McCarty, Curatorial Director, Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum. Tickets: $16/$12 Japan Society members, seniors & students

Workshop: Free-Form SAORI Weaving Workshop
Sunday, November 20. Morning session: 10 am-Noon. Afternoon session: 1:00-3:00 pm
Weaver Yukako Satone introduces participants to saori, a patternless, improvisational weaving style dedicated to free artistic expression and self-development, created by Misao Jo in 1969. No experience necessary; looms and materials included. Limited space available. Tickets: $70/$65 Japan Society members, students and seniors (includes exhibition entry).

Workshop: Irresistible Colors: Shibori-Dyeing Workshop
Saturday, December 3, 1:00-4:30pm
Learn the history of shibori and practice a time-honored cloth resist-dyeing process to produce one-of-a-kind silk scarves and small accessories with designer Katrin Reifeiss. No experience necessary. All materials included. Limited space available. Wear work clothes and bring an apron. Tickets: $90/$80 Japan Society members, students and seniors (includes exhibition entry).

Workshop: Nature's Inspiration: Embroidery Workshop
Saturday, December 10, 1:00-5:00 pm
Guided by artist Joetta Maue, discover the newest applications of one the oldest of all needle arts: embroidery. Learn basic stitches and techniques to make art that celebrates organic forms. Bring a favorite photo, quote or object as a reference point for your stitched art. No experience necessary. All basic materials included. Limited space available. Tickets: $100/$90 Japan Society members, students and seniors (includes exhibition entry).

Student Workshop: Fiber Futures: Japan's Textile Pioneers After School Workshop Series
Tuesday-Thursday, December 13-15, 2011, 3:30-5:30pm
High school students discover the rich wonders of contemporary Japanese textile and fiber art and experiment with art and design techniques to make their own wearable art object in this 3-day workshop. Limited space available. Tickets: $80/$75 Japan Society members. For more information please call 212-715-1224.

Sponsorship

Fiber Futures: Japan's Textile Pioneers is generously supported by the E. Rhodes & Leona B. Carpenter Foundation, The Coby Foundation, Ltd.; Chris A. Wachenheim; Friends of Fiber Art International; Henry and Gilda Buchbinder; Nomura Foundation, and the Leadership Committee for Fiber Futures: Japan's Textile Pioneers. Further significant funding has been received from the National Endowment for the Arts; and the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council. Media sponsorship is provided by WNYC. Transportation assistance is provided by Japan Airlines. Exhibitions at Japan Society are made possible in part by the Lila Wallace-Reader's Digest Endowment Fund and the Friends of the Gallery.

About Japan Society Gallery

Japan Society Gallery is among the premier institutions in the U.S. for the exhibition of Japanese art. Extending in scope from prehistory to the present, the Gallery's exhibitions since 1971 have covered topics as diverse as classical Buddhist sculpture and calligraphy, contemporary photography and ceramics, samurai swords, export porcelain, and masterpieces of painting from the thirteenth to the twentieth century. Each exhibition, with its related catalogue and public programs, is a unique cultural event that illuminates familiar and unfamiliar fields of art.

About Japan Society

Founded in 1907, Japan Society has evolved into a world-class, multidisciplinary hub for global leaders, artists, scholars, educators, and English and Japanese-speaking audiences. At the Society, more than 100 events each year feature sophisticated, topically relevant presentations of Japanese art and culture and open, critical dialogue on issues of vital importance to the U.S., Japan and East Asia. An American nonprofit, nonpolitical organization, the Society cultivates a constructive, resonant and dynamic relationship between the people of the U.S. and Japan.

Japan Society is located at 333 East 47th Street between First and Second Avenues (accessible by the 4/5/6 and 7 subway at Grand Central or the E and V subway at Lexington Avenue). The public may call 212-832-1155 or visit www.japansociety.org for more information.

Japan Society Gallery hours: Tuesday-Thursday, 11:00 am-6:00 pm; Friday, 11:00 am-9:00 pm; Saturday and Sunday, 11:00 am-5:00 pm; the Gallery is closed on Mondays and major holidays. Admission: $12/$10 students and seniors/FREE Japan Society members and children under 16. Admission is free to all on Friday nights, 6:00-9:00 pm. Docent tours are available free with admission Tuesdays-Sundays at 12:30 pm (English), and Fridays at 6:00 pm (Japanese); no appointment necessary.

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