YUGEN Gallery will hold Masahito Hiranuma's solo exhibition "CONTEMPORARY MUSIC" from Saturday, March 11th to Thursday, March 16th, 2023.

Contemporary music expressed in paintings

YUGEN Gallery opened in February 2022. Masahito Hiranuma held the first exhibition "#punk #rock #art #life" with Yoko Ayukawa.

Unlike the previous exhibition, which featured works by women dressed in decadent fashion with glittering makeup and underground rock divas, this exhibition will consist only of abstract paintings. CONTEMPORARY MUSIC”. Hiranuma will present 14 works, including 2 new works from the series Hiranuma has been working on since the 2010s.

Hiranuma was involved in the selection of music for Kansai Yamamoto's Paris/Tokyo collection, and worked as an assistant director. In 1990, Hiranuma moved to Paris, France, to begin his career as an artist, in order to come into contact with "real" art.

At the Louvre Museum, which he frequented at the time, he observed the use of painting materials and undercoatings of historical works that were in the process of being restored. He has come into contact with towering art and has developed his own painting methodology.

Abstract paintings that evoke emotions

Willem de Kooning said that he was particularly overwhelmed while touching many real things such as the Pieta statue of St. Peter's Basilica. I was so shocked that I was forced to give up painting by an artist who represented the Abstract Expressionism movement that arose in New York after the war. Strokes and rich colors that convey emotions and hand movements. In Hiranuma's work, which expresses the inner conflicts and joys of women, we can see a glimpse of the light that De Kooning has bathed in.

In the course of creating abstract figurative works, Hiranuma began working on a geometric series composed of a series of organic colors. At first, I began to think about the composition of the screen, and as I "played" with the drawing and connected the colors, I developed from a brush that directly felt emotions to a logical abstract expression work with self-control.

“I started drawing this series when I was listening to contemporary music by Steve Reich and Brian Eno, and I wanted to draw the sounds of harmony and discomfort that exist in contemporary music.”

Music surrounds us with waves like sunlight and speaks to us. Feeling the colors and shapes that appear in these waves, Hiranuma creates contemporary music as a painting. Apply multiple layers of color and adjust the color until you feel the wave of light. The warm colors and shapes collide and harmonize on the screen, which evokes the deepest emotions and sensations of the viewer like music.

The beginning of brilliant self-exploration

“There are a lot of artists with incredible skills, and we are in an era where we can freely choose various subjects and techniques. Whether it is abstract or figurative, whether it is painting or three-dimensional, it doesn’t matter what you mix. So, what do you choose?

“Painting is similar to cooking. Stir-frying onions is also a quest for deliciousness, and I concentrate on the ingredients themselves. I'm playing to see if it will show up."

The reason why Hiranuma is attracted to paintings is because "the brilliance and light received from the paintings purely remain in my heart as my own joy." He declares that he is not interested in works that do not bring joy, and says that now is the time to focus on the fundamental joy of human beings, when the concept is overflowing with contemporary art.

Masahito Hiranuma has created a minimalist work "ENCOUNTER" with a small number of colors, which will be exhibited in this exhibition, and has a feeling that he will be reborn as a painter after over 30 years of painting. The colors and lines are in harmony, and the light emitted from the screen becomes a symphony that envelops us and reverberates.