Event
Taro Yamamoto solo exhibition Kyogen and Nippon-ga: Traditional Performing Art Meets Classical Japanese style Painting
Jan 12, 2019 (sat) – Feb 16, 2019 (sat)
Hours: 12:00 ~ 18:00
Closed: Sunday, Monday and national holiday
Admission: free
Artist:Taro Yamamoto
Venue
Imura art gallery kyoto
http://www.imuraart.com/en.html
Access: 31, Kawabata Higashi Marutamachi, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto,
606-8395, Japan
Tel: 075-761-7372
Hours: 11:00 ~ 18:00
Closed: Sunday, Monday and national holiday
About
Imura Art Gallery is pleased to announce a solo exhibition by Nippon-ga artist Taro Yamamoto to commemorate Doji Shigeyama’s succession to the name Sennojo SHIGEYAMA, and showcase a new Kyogen costume. Since 1999 Taro Yamamoto has advocated for “Nippon-Ga”, a traditional but innovative style fusing contemporary customs with Japanese classical literature and classical performing arts as its base, and has taken part in numerous art exhibitions worldwide. In 2015, in commemoration of the 400th anniversary of Rimpa, his joint exhibition with Sekka Kamisaka, active in the Meiji, Taisho, and Showa, eras, attracted great acclaim. In addition to his many exhibitions in Japan, he has exhibited in locations such as Sydney, Minneapolis, Hawai’i, and Munich, where his work is met with high praise. In recent years he has been energetically expanding the range of his activities, creating collaborative works with companies, and carrying out projects rooted in regional areas all over Japan. Continuing his exchanges with the Okura School Kyogen performer Doji Shigeyama, Yamamoto has created the costume for Shigeyama to wear for “HANAGO,” his auspicious first Kyogen performance on succeeding to the name Sennojo Shigeyama III. Yamamoto’s designs for the costume are on display in this exhibition, together with the actual costume that resulted. Doji Shigeyama is an Okura School Kyogen performer based in Kyoto. As he attended an international school, he is proficient in English and is a bilingual Kyogen performer. While following the traditional path of Kyogen, he is also breaking new ground in that world by performing bilingual Kyogen at home and abroad, presenting his own new Kyogen, and writing scripts and directing in other genres. In December,2018, he announced that he would succeed to the name Sennojo, to become Sennojo Shigeyama III. He is commemorating taking this name by presenting his first performance of “HANAGO”, a virtuoso play that is especially important for Kyogen performers. The Shigeyama family has a long-held practice of requesting a painter representative of the era to draw the design for the “HANAGO” costume. What Taro Yamamoto has created will be the “Heisei HANAGO Costume.” It has been three years since Taro Yamamoto’s most recent solo exhibition in Kyoto in 2015, and five years since his last solo exhibition at Imura Art Gallery in 2013. Furthermore, 2019 marks a milestone for Yamamoto as it is the twentieth anniversary of his “Nippon Ga” declaration. The Shigeyama family has always sought to incorporate in performance the sensibility of each era, attempting new ventures, while at the same time taking responsibility for the traditional art of Kyogen. Within the Shigeyama family, the most innovative performer is Sennojo (Doji). Nippon-ga artist Taro Yamamoto plays a similar role by bringing the powerful essence of modern dynamism to traditional Japanese painting. These two artists seem to have been predestined to come together in this era. Please enjoy the merging of old and new, and that moment when innovation is brought to tradition.
【Talk Show】
Sennojo Shigeyama X Taro Yamamoto “Traditional Farce Meets Nippon-ga”
Talk: 1.19 (Sat.) 17:30 – 18:30
Reception: 19:00‒20:30
venue:imura art gallery Kyoto
