Mono-ha exhibition at Blum and Poe Art Gallery, 2012.
The word mono-ha in itself can be explained as “the art school of
things”, and it is known for its connection with the ideas prevailing in the
Japanese society during 1960 including cultural, political and social
implications. Namely, these were the ideas of nature preservation and care for
the well being of every living thing, and the environmental protection. In 1968
the first work accomplished in this style attracted the attention of public by
the above-mentioned concept’s realization. It was the artwork called
"Phase – Mother Earth" installed in Kobe’s Sumarikyu Park during the
First Open Air Contemporary Sculpture Exhibition. The work simply struck the
minds of the present ones with its unusual layout. It was a whole with the
depth of 2.7 meters and the diameter of 2.2 meters along with the excavated
earth next to it, which was compacted into a cylinder of similar size. The
power of this first remarkable piece of art accomplished in mono-ha style was
an incredible one. People were standing and evaluating it for long time. This
became a grandiose birth of mono-ha. Finally, one more important concept
addressed within this style is in topology. In this vein, the artworks of
mono-ha are characterized by the three-dimensionality and quantifiable
entities.
Further,
speaking about mono-ha style, its development and its main peculiarities, it
should be mentioned that it is the style peculiar for Japanese nature admiring
the way of thinking developed by Japanese artisans themselves without any other
influence from behind (Monroe, 261). The artworks of this style are
distinguished by their abundance of themes from surrounding world and daily
life of common Japanese people including nature and rural scenes with their
pleasures and joys. The artists and artisans of this movement became especially
active in the late sixties to early seventies of the twenties century. Mono-ha
style has its indicative feature of being accomplished in wood, steel or cement
without processing to express and discover a new modernism or abstract reality
(Mono-ha and the Search for Fundamentals, 84). The artworks from mono-ha style
reveal a lot of interesting details about Japanese way of thinking, and
especially about its moving affection for nature’s glory and inspiring
philosophic ideas.
Concluding on all the information related above, it should be stated that Japanese art could be described as especially permeated with the spirit of love and devotion to nature and its beauty along with the place of an individual in the Universe and the relationships with the world around us.
In my next blog I will introduce a famous modern Japanese artist Yoshitomo Nara who represent another modern art genre named Kimo kawaii.
References:
Jarves, James. A Glimpse at the Art of Japan, Japan: Boxerbooks, Inc. Print.
Mono-ha and the Search for
Fundamentals, Japan: The
Museum of Modern Art,
Saitama, 1995. Print.
Monroe,
Alexandra. “The Laws of Situation; Mono-ha and beyond the Sculptural
Paradigm”. Japanese Art after 1945: Scream against the Sky: 256-287. Print.
Tatehata,
Akira and Alfred Birnbaum. "Mono-ha and Japan's Crisis of the
Modern."
Third Text (September 2002):
223-236. Print.