September 13 through October 11, 2014
Open from 12 to 19 pm (closed on Sundays and national holidays)
reception for the artist：Seprmber 13th. 19 – 21 pm
Installation view
Aoyama | Meguro is pleased to announce our first solo exhibition with artist Shuzo Azuchi Gulliver (b. 1947).
Having perpetually worked on various projects for half a century since the 60s, Azuchi is widely recognized as a legendary figure. However, evaluation of his work itself has been put on hold for quite some time, especially in his native Japan, perhaps because of the overwhelming diversity of forms that his work has taken or the excessiveness of his words, deeds or appearance.
One can find his participation in many important exhibitions and events in the history of Japanese post-war avant-garde, which is currently being reevaluated globally, such as the inaugural 1967 exhibition “THE PLAY” and 1969’s “Intermedia Art Festival”. Since the 90s, his work has been increasingly exposed overseas, mainly in Italy, the Netherlands, and Germany, shown in various exhibitions including large-scale museum shows, while this fact has not been well recognized elsewhere.
It was out of this context that the year 2010 saw his enormous retrospective titled “EX-SIGN” at the Museum of Modern Art, Shiga, as well as several related events in Tokyo, through which the artist immediately attracted rising attention, notably from the younger generation. Informed of his practice for the first time, they were intrigued by how the artist had persistently developed his activity without any commercial relations (although back then there were few commercial galleries anyway), experimented with all possible materials, maintained an attitude of perpetually raising critical questions and suggestions, and committed to eccentric, abrupt words and deeds. Re-discovered by the younger generation as full of clear and concrete, rather than inexplicable and abstract, ideas, Azuchi’s artistic approach has influenced many artistic minds since then.
The pieces he has been recently working on very often have connections with what he made several years or even decades ago. In the current exhibition, he will install a new project constructed with inspiration from directional arrow signs, as well as a number of existing works that are somewhat related to it, such as “The things responded to the body/ Apple”, 1975.