"Traces: Body and Idea in Contemporary Art," a new exhibition showing at the National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto (soon to be seen in Tokyo) fleshes out what has been distinctive in art since the postwar '50s right up to recent times.
Grouping together 125 works, half by Japanese artists and half by a diverse American and European contingent, the story begins with artists' preoccupation after World War II with the surface they painted on.
In Shimamoto Shozo's abstract painting "Work," thick impacted paint is cracked and gives way to reveal the gallery wall behind. Lee U Fan's "Cut Up" had the artist gouging into a wooden surface. Yoshida Toshio scorched pretty patterns into his "SEP." These expressions of anxiety quickly escalated and Yves Klein set to work with a giant blow torch for his "Peinture feu sans titre."