Volume 04, Number 20
Diversions
By Owen Schaefer
Tichy in Tokyo
While the definition of “outsider art” has been a little watered down over time, it was initially associated with the art of the mentally ill. Obsession likewise hovers around the borders of instability and obsessive-compulsive disorder. The work of photographer Miroslav Tichy comes somewhere in between these two forms without fitting neatly into either, and that is likely what's attracting so much attention.
There is no doubt that Tichy himself is a kind of outsider. Now over 80 years old, he has not left his home village in decades and declares exhibitions of his work a waste of time. Tichy was educated at the Academy of Art in Prague, but fell into conflict with the rising communist regime in 1948 and wound up spending eight years shunted between government prisons and asylums—his only mental illness at the time being a rebellious mindset and refusal to conform. But following his incarcerations, Tichy became an eccentric recluse, considered the town drunk.
He began to work exclusively in photography, and remained unknown for decades until a childhood friend discovered what he had been up to and began to exhibit the works in 2004.
Tichy's black and white prints are grainy and blurry, sometimes written on with pencil, sometimes fitted with improvised cardboard frames. But the impoverished nature of these photos is not an affectation; Tichy was penniless for years, and resorted to building his own cameras out of tin cans, cigarette boxes, eyeglass lenses and whatever else he could find. They are often used only once or twice and then discarded.
Over more than two decades, the main focus of his unfocused images has been women. Almost obsessively so. Tichy has often taken more than a hundred photos per day, in true voyeuristic style—hiding in shrubbery, keeping the camera hidden beneath his coat, peeping over fences. But the thousands of photos that he has captured of local women in his village have been anything but cared for. With no thought toward preservation, Tichy left them to fade, rot, and be chewed by mice, giving the pictures an ephemeral quality that other photographers using digital equipment struggle to recreate. And it is in this state that Tichy's work arrives for the first time in Tokyo.
The Taka Ishii Gallery brings only a taste of the artist's life-long body of work, but it precedes a number of major showings around the world in 2008, and has the makings of an historic event. Along with 29 works in various states of disrepair, representing the artist's obsessive but refreshingly honest work, one of his homemade cameras will also be on display— a work of art in itself.
Miroslav Tichy (to Nov. 2) Taka Ishii Gallery. Kayabacho Metro Station. Free. 11am–7am. Closed Sun. & Mon. Tel. 03-3552-3363. www.takaishiigallery.com
Reach Out and Break Something
Ceramic art doesn't generally get billed as one of the most happening art forms and is more likely to be associated with archeology than installations. But D.H. Rosen is out to prove that false. Out of Reach is Rosen's second installation work to be put on at Roppongi's Super Deluxe night-club-slash-art-space, and the venue says a lot about his approach to the work. It's current, multi-layered and participative.
Rosen lives in Japan and has been trained in traditional Japanese pottery, but his designs are seldom traditional. His vessels and sculptures are often organic and even gravity defying, and he seems to be turning more and more toward full-scale installations. Out of Reach explores the idea of a neverending cycle of reaching for goals and goods through the somewhat eerie image of hundreds of reaching hands. But by involving the audience in a one-night performance, it also explores the relationship between viewer and artwork, and creation and destruction.
At a mid-week reception, audience members will be able to add their own hands to the installation, and will be asked to shatter certain pieces, which will then be incorporated into the installation. “There can be no creation without destruction, and I am just making that transition literal,” Rosen says, while remaining secretive about the exact details of what will be broken.
The installation opens at Super Deluxe from Oct. 23, and the performance event will take place on Friday, Oct. 26, along with live music and DJs.
Out of Reach (Oct. 23–28) Super Deluxe. Roppongi Metro Station. Price: T.B.A. 6pm–2am. Tel. 03-5412- 0515. www.geocities.jp/wtymd050/
Listings:
Zen Treasures from the Kyoto Gozan Temples (to Nov. 9) Some of the most important Zen works collected together under one roof. Tokyo National Museum. Ueno Station (JR, Metro). ¥1,500. 9:30am–5pm. Closed Mon. Tel. 03- 3822-1111. www.tnm.jp/en/
A World of Stage: Russian designs for theater, opera and dance (to Nov. 17) Paintings, costumes and photographs from the glory period of the Ballets Russes. Tokyo Metropolitan Teien Art Museum. Meguro Station. ¥1,000. 10am–6pm Closed Wed. Tel. 03-3443-8500. www.teien-art-museum.ne.jp
Matthias Goerne (Nov. 19–Nov. 24) Three shows from the visiting baritone from Germany, doing the Lieder songs he does best. Sep. 19, 21 (7pm) & Sep. 24 (4pm) Tokyo Opera City Concert Hall. Hatsudai Station (Keio Line). ¥3,000–¥5,000. Tel. 03-5353-9999. www.operacity.jp
Gifts from the World of Dreams: Georges Rouault, Odilon Redon, Kiyoshi Hasegawa, Tetsuro Komai (to Dec. 2) Paintings of the strange and dreamlike, from four masters of the mood. Setagaya Art Museum. Yoga Station (Tokyu Denentoshi Line). ¥1,000. 10am–6pm Closed Mon. Tel. 03-3415-6011. www.setagayaartmuseum.or.jp
Roppongi Crossing 2007: Future Beats in Japanese Contemporary Art (to Jan. 14) Guest curators and 36 contemporary Japanese artists point toward the future of art. Mori Art Museum. Roppongi Metro Station. ¥1,500. 10am–10pm. (Tue. until 5pm) Tel. 03-6406-6100. www.mori.art.museum
MOT-Bloomberg: Public 'Space' Project (to Jan. 20) Single large-scale installation by Kengo Kito outside of the museum. Museum of Contemporary Art. Kiba Metro Station. Free. 10am–6pm Closed Monday Tel. 03- 5245-4111. www.mot-art-museum.jp