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Tatsuo Miyajima Drawings
Buchmann Galerie is delighted to announce the first solo exhibition of drawings by Tatsuo Miyajima (*1957, Tokyo)
Tatsuo Miyajima is one of Japan‘s most important sculptors and installation artists. In his œuvre, the artist – who became known primarily for his works using digital light diodes (LED) – is concerned with concepts of time, its (non-) calculability and its cultural and existential dimension.
One important component of the works is counting and sequences of numbers. These numbers, appearing in continuous and recurrent - although not necessarily consecutive - cycles from 1 to 9, represent the journey of life until death, whose finality is symbolized by ‚0‘ or the zero point. Consequently, this never appears in the artist‘s work. The series of works on paper from 1995 to 2018 now collected in the Buchmann Box explore several issues essential to Tatsuo Miyajima‘s work.
Kũ Drawing Series
In the Zen tradition Kũ stands for emptiness (Kũ is the transcription of the Sanskrit word sunya or sunyata, translated literally as „emptiness“). Tatsuo Miyajima describes how he produced these drawings in a state of Kũ, holding a pencil in his hand, his eyes closed: The lines from my subconscious show my time spent in emptiness. The length of time given in the title, 15 minutes for example, describes the period of time which I spent in an altered state of mind, with my eyes closed.
Innumerable Counts Series
Every number in these drawings represents a moment in the counting cycle from 9 to 1. The empty space in the potentially infinite sequence of numbers represents the figure zero, which - as indicated above - does not appear in his work. In these drawings the artist is attempting to grasp moments in cycles of innumerable counts. The Innumerable Counts visualize life for Tatsuo Miyajima. The spirals or lines in the drawings are thus excerpts from a broader context, from innumerable moments in time.
Count Down Drawing Series
Tatsuo Miyajima provides a different interpretation of the zero, the empty space, in his Count Down Drawing Series: this series of works shows a repeated sequence, counting down from 9 to 1, as the title suggests. Here, too, the place of zero (Kũ) is represented by an empty space or fille with a thin gold foil or a microchip. In this variation the empty space is filled; it is, as the artist points out, the field provided with every possibility, the field of potential.
The artist‘s works on paper are an essential component of his practice, seen as equal in status to the installation pieces and performances. They complete the artist‘s complex œuvre, which is characterized by investigation into the significance of counting and time, and by subtle meditations exhibiting sublime precision and finesse.
Important works by the artist can be found in collections including the Tate Gallery London, the Bavarian State Collection of Painting Munich, La Caixa Barcelona, the Deste Foundation in Athens, the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, Leeum Seoul, Kunstmuseum Bern, and M+ in Hong Kong.
Please feel free to contact the gallery at any time for more information about the artist or visual materials.
Tatsuo Miyajima
Born 1957 in Tokyo. Lives and works in Ibaraki, Japan.
2012 - 2016 Kyoto University of Art & Design Vice President
2006 - 2016 Tohoku University of Art & Design Vice President
| 1986 | Completed postgraduate studies at Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music (M.A.) |
| 1984 | Graduated from Oil Painting Course, Fine Arts Department, Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music (B.A.) |
| 1998 | London Institute honorary doctorate |
| 1993 | Fondation Cartier pour l'art contemporain, Paris |
| 1990–1991 | DAAD Scholarship Berliner Kunstprogramm Berlin, |
| 1990 | ACC - Asian Cultural Council, New York |
National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto, Japan
Hara Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan
Museum of Modern Art, Shiga, Japan
Nagoya City Art Museum, Nagoya, Japan
Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan
Panasonic Museum in Osaka, Japan
FARET Tachikawa, Tokyo, Japan
TV Asahi building, Tokyo, Japan
Tokyo Opera City, Tokyo, Japan
Chiba City Museum, Chiba, Japan
Group Home Sala in Florence Village, Akita, Japan
The Museum of Modern Art, Saitama, Japan
Contemporary Art Museum, Kumamoto, Japan
Toyota Municipal Museum of Art, Aichi, Japan
Saitama Prefectural University, Saitama, Japan
Izumi City Plaza, Osaka, Japan
Naoshima Contemporary Art Museum, Kagawa, Japan
Iwaki City Art Museum, Fukushima, Japan
Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art, Hiroshima, Japan
M+ Museum, Hong Kong
Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Taiwan
Samsung Cultural Foundation, Seoul, Korea
Leeum, Samsung Museum, Seoul, Korea
Chinese Telecom, Taipei, China
Tate Gallery, London, UK
The British Museum, London, UK
Deste Foundation for Contemporary Art, Athens, Greece
Fondation Cartier pour l'art contemporain, Paris, France
Kunstmuseum Bern, Bern, Switzerland
Kunstmuseum St. Gallen, Switzerland
Université de Genève, Switzerland
La Caixa, Barcelona, Spain
Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich, Germany
Kunstmuseum Stuttgart, Germany
Fondazione TESECO per l'Arte, Pisa, Italy
Chateau La Coste, Aix-en-Provence, France
Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, Texas, U.S.A.
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, U.S.A.
Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, U.S.A.
Dallas Museum of Art, U.S.A.
Denver Art Museum, Denver, U.S.A.
Dannheisser Foundation, New York, U.S.A.
National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, Canada
Oakville Galleries, Oakville, Canada
Australian Museum, Sydney, Australia
| 2005 | ARTISTS SUMMIT, KYOTO, Kyoto University of Art and Design, Kyoto, Japan |
| 2002 | Collaboration with SOPHNET (fashion design brand) 2002 A/W Collection Tokyo 1000 Real Life Project - Death Clock, Tokyo |
| 2000 | Floating Time - Hospice Project, Sotoasahikawa Hospital, Akita |
| 1998 | Portfolio for The Edge of Awareness |
| 1995 | Portfolio for 4. Uluslararasi Istanbul Bienali－ORIENT / ATION |
| 1994 | Mirror, multiple, Spiral, Tokyo |
| 1993 | Over Economy, acrylic, pencil on bank note \10,000 |
| 1992 | Project for PARKETT |
| 1984 | Time Funeral, record jacket, SMS Records |
