Yutaro Aoki “double”
I visited Yutaro Aoki’s solo exhibition “double.” The venue was MONO.LOGUES in Nakano.
Taking everyday life as his subject, Aoki produces sculptural works that combine simple forms out of familiar materials such as wood and metal.
By carefully considering the character of each site before installing his sculptures, he also succeeds in making the works function as something like an architectural space.
Aoki’s works, which carry the concept of Minimalism, are so pared-down in their elements that they leave broad room for the viewer’s own interpretation. That very openness gives the viewer space to enter the work, bringing with it a sense of familiarity, intimacy, and shared ground.
Aoki also accepts, quite naturally, the various phenomena, situations, and environments that surround him, and reproduces the states in which they simply appear — as facts — in the form of works. In this way, his own personality, too, is reflected in the exhibition space.
<Artist Statement>
Whenever I head to the studio, or go out for work or travel, I am always moving by car.
As I drive, I can see the scenery passing by from the car window.
As I keep going, that scenery — the scenery still visible — keeps moving.
The farther it is from me, the more slowly it moves; I can sense the subject shifting little by little.
The faster I drive, the narrower my field of vision becomes; nearby things pass by in an instant and vanish.
Amid the flowing scenery, there are things that disappear from view, and things glimpsed only faintly at the edge of my sight.
I capture the situations that change with speed of movement, and give them form.
What is visible, as visible; what is invisible, as invisible — I express a space in which both can be recognized.
An exceptionally pleasing exhibition that made full use of the whole exhibition space.
