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Poster design: Yokoo Tadanori
Yokoo Tadanori is a writer as well as a painter, and his novel Genkyo no mori (“forest in soul”) was published in 2022 by Bungeishunju. In this book, the protagonist Y is guided by Mishima Yukio and cosmic spirits to discuss art and life with some 280 departed souls, from Yokoo’s favorite artists such as Pablo Picasso, Giorgio de Chirico, Marcel Duchamp, and Man Ray, to cultural figures he actually interacted with such as Kurosawa Akira and the art critic Tono Yoshiaki, and even Nostradamus, the Buddhist monk Shinran, the Buddha himself, and Yokoo’s cat Tama, which appear one after the other and speak their various truths. All of them have directly or indirectly influenced Yokoo’s life thus far and have been involved in shaping his artistic vision, often making their presence felt in Yokoo’s vast body of work.
In this exhibition, Yokoo’s paintings and prints are interspersed throughout the exhibition space, which is modeled on a forest, in an attempt to give visual form to what the novel expresses in words. Wandering through Yokoo’s genkyo no mori like the book’s main character Y, and experiencing the forest through your eyes, ears, and sometimes your sixth sense, you may at some point find yourself joining Y at the grand forum of the departed.
Adult ¥700
University students ¥550
Age 70 and over ¥350
High school students and younger Free
Also on View: YOKOO TADANORI COLLECTION GALLERY 2023 Part1
The Yokoo Tadanori Collection Gallery, newly established in 2021, was designed to display documents from Yokoo Tadanori’s archive as well as showcasing a diverse range of collections that Yokoo has maintained for many years in order to provide a deeper and slightly different perspective on the artist’s body of work.
In conjunction with the concurrent exhibition Yokoo Tadanori: Forest in Soul (Genkyo no mori), the third in this series of exhibits features works by Francis Picabia (1879-1953), Giorgio de Chirico (1888-1978), Andy Warhol (1928-1987), and other artists who appear in Yokoo’s novel Genkyo no mori. What messages do these masters of modern and contemporary Western art, all of whom Yokoo reveres, deliver in the novel? In addition to the works, please look at the text excerpted from Yokoo’s book, and let them be your guide to explore the “forest in soul” more deeply.
Also presented here are works that Yokoo has been fascinated by and actively collected, although there is no data about them, even the artists’ names. Taken all together, this body of work may represent an archetype of the “forest” where countless artists, old and new, famous and unknown, gather and speak to us.
Dates May 27 (Sat.) – August 27 (Sun.), 2023
Closed: Mondays (except Jul. 17) and Jul.18
Hours: 10:00 – 18:00 (admission until 17:30)
