Kyuzaburo Ito --- Limpid Lyricism and Illusion

Place and Organizer:
O Art Museum
Shinagawa Cultural Promotion Association

Date:
February 10 to March 8, 1995 　

Lecture:
Yoshiaki Inui (art critic) 2:00 - 4:00 p.m., Saturday, February 25, 1995 at O Art Museum 　

Gallery Talk:
Kazuo Amano (Curator, O Art Museum) at O Art Museum. 2:00- 4:00 p.m., February 11, 19, 26 and March 4

The first and comprehensive retrospective in Tokyo of Kyuzaburo Ito, known for his paintings always full of fragrance and lyrics, based on his experience of the Surrealism before the Pacific War, and added with his free imagination.

Ito was born in Kyoto in 1906, graduated from the Japanese ?style painting division of Kyoto Municipal School of Paintings, came to live in Magome, Tokyo studying at the Institute of 1930 Association, and began to paint Fauvistic pictures in the most avant-garde atmosphere of the Western-style paintings of the day.　　Soon his work was accepted in the Nika exhibition, and since then, his brilliant activity in the Nika exhibitions promptly came to public notice. His limpid and poetic works had already had, under the Surrealistic influence of the day, his own style, which is still relevantly fresh even today. He was one of the avant garde artists of the time, becoming a starting member of the Kyushitsu-kai, an avant garde group within the Nika-kai, as well as participating in other groups, such as Shin Aburae Ten and Shin Bijutsuka Kyokai.

During the war, Ito returned to Kyoto, and when the war was over, he joined Kodo Bijutsu Kyokai from its first exhibition and kept presenting his works mainly with the group. His style gradually showed a tendency toward abstract art, and he continued his activity until 1957, when his works were invited to Sao Paulo Biennial Exhibition. However, after 1958 when he was hospitalized due to a chest disease, he stopped publicizing his work, though he worked as a professor at Seian Girls College, keeping painting more freely and produced the works richer in variety secluding himself in his own proud and lonely world. In 1976 he was awarded from Kyoto City as an artist who had done a distinguished work. He passed away in 1977 at the age of 71.

In the following year, his retrospective show was held at the Kyoto Municipal Art Museum, and later the book of his paintings was published. His life as an artist is duly accessed mainly in Kyoto. But in Tokyo, not a thorough retrospective of his has been held through his life time nor up till today. And due to the artist’s own attitude in his late years to cut connection with the artists’ society, his presence as a great artist failed to receive its proper appreciation in the history of Japanese art. His world of paintings keeps the limpidity still relevant today and, in fact, surpasses his image as a mere pioneer of abstract paintings in Kyoto. Taking up common and concrete objects like feathers, stones, or buttons, he weaves his own illusionistic dream world with a variety of images. His humorous and witty paintings of bright colors and clear images suggests a more tender and lyrical world than the one of anxiety. His shrewd sense of decorativeness reminiscent of the Japanese tradition, multifariously and constantly appeals to us with its poetic clarity. This exhibition will be the first comprehensive retrospective of his in Tokyo, with more than 80 oil paintings, and something over 10 drawings, trying to present a full portrait of the artist, who can be called the last artist that needs to be re-discovered. And with it we hope that he will be justly appreciated and, to the viewer, it is our pleasure to introduce this fresh and unknown artist.