for the debut in Paris+ by Art Basel, Taka Ishii Gallery In Tokyo, I decided to go back in time to the history of art for inspiration. For the theme of the fair, the gallery has chosen a sculpture of the so-called Lion Man, found in a cave in Germany in 1939 and believed to be 40,000 years old.
What makes the image so appealing to gallery owner Taka Ishii is that it is a hybrid figure with a human body and a lion’s head. works of art Lascaux Cave in France, is often just an image of the known world. But the Lion Man is clearly a human depiction of a more evolved figure. It is a figure of a god-like or made-up person beyond the mundane creatures that roamed the earth thousands of years ago.
Based on that idea, Mr. Ishii invited four artists to create new works for Paris+, and created the idea of ”hybrid figures” by referring to the artwork of five other artists. Ishii wanted to honor the true origin of the artwork.The Lion Man is carved out of the bones of a mammoth and has been called the first artistic image created by humans.A painting of three wild boars. believed to be 45,000 years oldwas discovered last year in Indonesia.
“The reason why I imagined that it might look like a Buddha statue from 40,000 years ago is because it looks like a god,” says Mr. Ishii. “What’s interesting is that there was creativity in prehistoric times. It’s a timeless beauty.”
the beauty inspired Naka Sato, a Japanese-style painter based in Tokyo, but not in an obvious way. Hybrid The challenge of creating his figures speaks to his usual approach of mixing many figures in a very random and intense way. Mr. Sato is very active in the “hybrid figure”. His painting “Maisonhantée” took him three months to paint. He said there are dozens of images, many of which are very disturbing and daresque and reflective of the state of the world.
“This was inspired by the haunted houses that were at summer festivals in Japan during the summers of my childhood,” he explained. “The world scares me because there are so many bad and sad things happening right now.”
However, he wanted to portray that fear and release it in a way. , the act of painting something so complex seems to take on a life of its own, like a third entity.
“I’m trying to understand what can be born as a hybrid of me and the world. For me, it’s my third entity,” Sato explained. “This painting is the result of a relationship between me and the world. I am not trying to overcome my fear, but understanding what it is.”
The ten artists at the gallery’s Paris+ booth range from photographers to painters to sculptors. Tomoo Gokita, Sanya Kantarovsky, Mr. Sato, and Mr. Hiroka Yamashita created new works. Mr. Ishii chose works by Nobuyoshi Araki and Sean Landers and arranged works of the residences of the late Tatsuo Ikeda, Goro Kakei and Kansuke Yamamoto.
Ishii said the collection took on a surreal tone, which seemed appropriate for the hybrid subject matter and the moment.
“Surrealism is very popular now,” he said. ” The Venice Biennale makes heavy use of Surrealism”
Ishii said that the works of two particular artists, both of whom have passed away, seemed a natural fit for “hybrid figures.”
“Here are some of the works of photographer Kansuke Yamamoto, who is famous for having a retrospective exhibition at the Getty Museum in Los Angeles in the 1950s. ‘ is a very surreal mix of animal skeletons and human bodies.It works perfectly.”
Similarly, the work of Japanese avant-garde artist Tatsuo Ikeda, who passed away in 2020, contains a fish but has a human face.
“It’s just a coincidence that there are deceased artists in this collection,” said Ishii. “Historical artwork doesn’t look old to me. It can look very fresh.”
for painters Hiroka Yamashitaalso debuted in Paris+ with four oil-on-linen works, but the inspiration for “hybrid figures” was similar to how she approaches many of her other works.
“Sometimes an artist has a specific plan, but for this art fair, Taka sent me a statement about his hybrid concept, which I improvised,” said Yamashita. “I started with a brush and some different colors of paint. They started to melt and look like face and body parts.”
The hybrid idea, she said, helped each painting have its own identity. She explained that it was the same as some of the previous landscape works of . It takes on new meaning when one considers a 40,000-year-old work of art.
“What I do in my work is look at humans from the natural world and the landscape, and how we exist in a multidimensional world,” she said. I’m trying to visualize behavior, but I’m trying to demonstrate the human need for spiritual connection.”