Hitomi Uchikura
05.09.2025 - 04.10.2025
Lumière
Japan Art - Galerie Friedrich Müller
Hitomi Uchikura: Poetry in moons and mirrors
Aomi Okabe (curator, art critic)
Send the scent of the moon (Fall 1953)
Send the scent to the moon (Winter 1962) ¹
This spring, I had the opportunity to view a major exhibition of Hitomi Uchikura's works in Japan.² They hung and stood quietly amidst the warm-looking wooden columns and door panels and the pure white of the walls and shōji sliding door of an old family home built in the traditional style. It had been given a new lease of life as a gallery, but still bore traces of honest craftsmanship. Soft, natural light streaming through the milky glass of the tall windows brought a touch of vibrancy to the spacious open-roofed space - and something of a subtle resonance to the artwork.
The five works in the Lumière series, in the format of large, stately kakemono scrolls, had a majestic aura. With their innumerable circles pressed into them, they were reminiscent of bubbles of primordial life, born in the great oceans, or of the sight of constellations in the firmament. As I immersed myself in the works, I suddenly thought of Yoko Ono's instructions Fragrance . No doubt Ono would have said to me when I looked at these works:
"Imagine a night sky with a thousand moons."
Faced with the beauty of a milky night sky full of moons, even the mighty sun might have to abdicate its throne...
Hitomi Uchikura's (born 1956 in Kagoshima) exploration of light began over 30 years ago, when sunlight accidentally fell on a pile of mirror shards next to a window in her studio in spring, triggering a firework display of light circles. But this enlightenment, as if brought about by the hand of a higher being, did not bear fruit immediately; on the contrary, the artist's self-doubt only deepened. The solution she found to overcome this personal crisis was more than unusual:
She decided that the best way to objectify her human self was to live with an animal - and bought a pony foal. Horses are noble creatures, and this one is as headstrong as a cat. While she was raising the animal, Uchikura moved to Nasu - a place that reminded her of her home in Kagoshima. She still lives and works there today in her studio, which is covered by a Buckminster Fuller dome.
Uchikura speaks of the beauty of nature, how it captivates her "when, just before sunrise, dewdrops form in the spider webs that hang everywhere in summer and begin to glow." This silvery, kaleidoscopic magic can be found in the depths of the Bright Cells ' lenses. It is created by the broken mirror glass that lines the inside of the hollow spheres, which look like sea creatures wrapped in goatskin.
"Break your mirror and scatter the pieces over different countries. Travel, collect the pieces and glue them back together..."³.
Yoko Ono takes us on a journey through destruction and rebirth. First you destroy the shape of your own self. Then, thanks to some help, you are reborn - full of scars. Perhaps it is thanks to the pony that lived with her for over 25 years that Uchikura matured into an internationally active artist whose works can now be found not only in Japan, but also in countries such as France and Germany - spread all over the world, in ever new and innovative series of works.
Her new large-format series Mirage is an example. The paper is cut away around circles, as in the Lumière works, revealing a mirror hidden behind it, which shows its reflections in the perforations in the paper surface. The works reflect both the space in which they are positioned and the people in the room. If you move in front of them and look, it creates an almost cosmic feeling, as if you were looking down at the earth through the clouds.
As one of the young artists who sought new paths in painting and applied arts in the early 1980s, Uchikura was able to follow the lessons of mono-ha artist Lee U-fan at the art academy and thus refine her feel for materials.
After so many years, Uchikura had almost completely forgotten about it, but as a graduate student at the academy, she created works in a minimalist style by dropping drops of water mixed with small amounts of pigment and glue onto large sheets of washi paper to form a relief. One could say that there is a link here to the Lumière works, whose relief is also formed using water.
Hitomi Uchikura continues her artistic journey in search of the light, knowing full well that it will never end. Meanwhile, she delights in the dialogues that unfold between her works and the people in the world.
---------
¹ Translated from Yoko Ono, Grapefruit (reprint London: Sphere Books, 1971) p. 54: Smell Piece I and Smell Piece II, in Section 3: Event.
² Reborn in New Luster, solo exhibition by Hitomi Uchikura, Takemasa House, Saitama, May 3-25, 2025, celebrating the completion of the renovation of the 1881 building.
Translated from Yoko Ono, op. cit., p. 103: Collecting Piece III, in Section 5: Object.
Japan Art - Galerie Friedrich Müller
Braubachstraße 9
60311 Frankfurt am Main
T. +49 69 282 839
E. mail@japan-art.com