Meguru Yamaguchi “YOUR OLD FRIEND”
We visited Meguru Yamaguchi’s solo exhibition “YOUR OLD FRIEND.” The venue is PARCO MUSEUM TOKYO in Shibuya.
Visitors enter the venue by passing through vinyl sheets sprayed with paint.
Once inside, a recreation of the New York studio where Yamaguchi is based unfolds before you.
This is a key part of the exhibition — a space that lets you feel the very air, charged with creative energy.
The exhibition features seven new works employing Yamaguchi’s signature brushstroke motif.
Especially eye-catching is the monumental new work SPLITTING HORAIZON NO.22, measuring 2.7m tall by 4m wide.
This monumental piece is the largest-scale display of Yamaguchi’s brushstroke works ever shown domestically — a jaw-dropping-scale work in which brushstrokes, laid down in one uninhibited sweep of vivid color, are constructed with dynamic yet meticulous precision.
Though large, the work is composed of multiple laser-cut panels joined together into a single piece.
Also on view are early works, including pieces produced in the early 2000s during Yamaguchi’s college-exam prep school years.
At the end of the exhibition, collaborative works were shown in which Yamaguchi applied paint to photographs by his New York-based friend, the photographer Jiro Konami.
The collaborative works with Konami were sold in limited numbers by lottery.
During the exhibition period, Yamaguchi returned to Japan to create wall artworks on-site at the venue — an exhibition that offered a sweeping view of his practice from its earliest stages to the present.
