One of the greatest mysteries of art is what exactly the flat two-dimensional surface of the canvas is, and what it is for. The mundane answer, of course, is that it's a convenient rectangular surface on which to place and display aesthetically pleasing colors and lines. But this does not really explain the powerful effects that can be created on it or the fascination that it exercises on the minds of artists, such as Natsuyuki Nakanishi, who started his career as a Dadaist performance artist but is now one of Japan's most respected painters.
With an exhibition of new works at SCAI the Bathhouse in Tokyo, Nakanishi is keen to explain the philosophy that lies behind or within the large, vaguely floral or netlike abstract canvases that make up the show.
"Alberti said that painting is a window, but I think the eyes are more like the windows," the 74-year-old painter states, invoking the theories of Leon Battista Alberti, the Renaissance art theorist who first attempted to explain the mysteries of the 2-D canvas plane.