Tenmyouya Hisashi Solo Exhibition “Transformation” Mizuma Art Gallery (Tokyo,Japan)

10 January - 10 February 2017

Tenmyouya presents new work created under the title of “transformation”: a term which in biology denotes the infiltration of external DNA into an organism’s genetic information, thereby altering that organism’s individual phenotype. This form of alteration based upon material composition or origin differs in type from a random, purely natural change. This form of change is, above all, one that symbolizes Tenmyouya’s own unique artistic practice in that, while emulating the concepts and structures of Japanese classical art, the work he creates is not an incidental occurrence, but rather a thoroughly pre-meditated transformation.

In this exhibition Tenmyouya presents audaciously altered visions of a work comprising a pair of six-panel folding screens featuring rakuchuu-rakugai-zu (‘scenes in and around the Capital’) motifs, which was created by an unknown artist during the Bakumatsu-Meiji Period (the years at the end of the Edo and beginning of the Meiji eras, which saw the conclusion of the Tokugawa shogunate). In addition to one of Tenmyouya’s largest two-dimensional pieces, the show will feature work that transforms into a contemporary sensibility the motifs of traditional Buddhist deity images (myouou-zu), as well as the well-known Rimpa school folding-screen piece Red and White Plum Blossoms. Also shown will be sculptural pieces, as variants upon the armour of samurai. Finally, for this exhibition Tenmyouya will present his first ever ventures within the medium of photography.

Classical Japanese art forms such as Rimpa, Maruyama, musha-e (warrior pictures), rakuchuu-rakugai-zu, Buddhist pictures and samurai armour: the works of this exhibition take their inspiration from this vast array of aesthetic schools and genealogies, whilst radically collapsing traditional phenotypes. As such they form a truly diverse range of content, the images of all of which have been in some regard transfigured into the contemporary.

天明屋尚個展「形質転換」ミヅマアートギャラリー (東京)

2017年01月10日 - 02月10日

今展では、「形質転換（Transformation）」と題して新作を発表。形質転換とは生物学の用語で、外部から与えたDNAを遺伝情報として組み込み、個体の表現型を変化させることを指します。その物質の組成や由来を踏まえて変化させる点で、無方向的な突然変異とは異なります。これはまさに、日本美術のコンセプトや組成を踏襲した上で、偶発的ではなく、確信犯的な改変を仕掛けてきた天明屋の作風を象徴しています。

本展は、幕末明治期作とされる作者不明の洛中洛外図屏風(六曲一双)を大胆に変容させた、天明屋の作品のなかでは最大級の平面作品のほか、仏画の明王図や琳派の紅白梅図屏風を現代的に改変した作品、従来の鎧兜を変異させた立体作品を展示。さらに初の試みとなる写真作品も発表予定です。

日本の古美術である琳派、円山派、武者絵、洛中洛外図、仏画、鎧兜など様々な流派や系譜から着想を得つつも、伝統的な表現型を崩し、現代的にイメージ変容させた多彩な内容となります。