Private Gallery - Kumabe
1. About Shigeko Kumabe
2. Biography
3. ThumbneilShigeko Kumabe is a Japanese artist who has been here in the United States for the past five years under the auspices of the Japanese government and the NEA cultural exchange program. She is a consummate printmaker who came here as an accomplished artist. but what I find most interesting. is her willingness to grow and change. Her previous work which was all done on one plate utilized all the techniques of intaglio layered one over the other on one plate. Her new work done in New York at Bob BlackbirdÕs Printmaking Workshop utilizes photo-etching and collagraph on several plates and the printing of all the various plates layered on one piece of paper. She told me that when she first came to Bob Blackburn's Workshop she did prints like she did in Japan. but little by little. felt that there was no need to do that while she was here. She felt swamped by the experience of being in such a metropolitan center as New York. and wondered how she was going to make art here. She decided to learn photo-etching and made both the Kodaliths and plates herself with the help of some fellow artists at the Workshop. She found herself entranced with images and made. many plates for a period of three years. Some of these plates. she didn't even proof. but went on to make more images and plates. Now she is in the process of putting the plates together to make images. The creative process is alive in both the choice of images. but also in the printing where she makes decisions about which images and where they are placed on the larger sheet of paper. Aside from technical issues only of interest to fellow printmakers. the look of the work has gone under radical change. On close perusal of the work. I don't think the content has really changed. In the earlier work. there were animals and humans in movement across the page. In the new work there are juxtapositions of children. parts of bodies. and faces and plant forms on a textured background. They give an impression of the multiplicity of human experience. and perhaps. most importantly. the experience of the artist. There is a sense of the depth of experience as well. before coming to New York. the artist had never left Japan. Her idea of the world had been mainly from her own country. My impression is that the experience of the artist being bombarded by the many experiences one has in a city like New York has deepened her sense of the world and her art.
1980~87 Kanagawa Prefectual Art Exhibition, Kanagawa Pref. Kenmin Hall Gallery, Yokohama, 87 Special Prize 1981 The 6th Print Show of Universities, All Japan , Osaka Forme Gallery Tokyo 1983 The 6th Print Show of Universities, All Japan, Marunouchi Gallery, Tokyo ,ShowÕs purchase for collection 1982~88 Exhibition of the Japan Print Association (except 83) , Tokyo Metropolitan Museum, Tokyo , Nominated to Awards & recommended for a Junior Member 1987 The 3rd Seibu Triennial of Prints - 1987 , Seibu Art Forum, Tokyo & Tsukashin Hall, Amagasaki,ÅA The 13th International Independence Exhibition of Prints in Kanagawa'87 Kanagawa Pref. Kenmin Hall Gallery, Yokohama, The 3rd International Biennial Print Exhibit, 1987 ROC, Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Taipei, ROC 1988 International Prints 1988, Sivermine Gallery, Stanford , USA Szoke Graphics, New York , USA The 12th International Print Biennial, Cracow 1988 , The Exhibition Hall of e Bureau for artistic Exhibition , Krakow, Poland e Gallery of Modern Art, towline, Poland The 24th Kanagawa Prefectual Art Exhibition , Kanagawa Pref. Kenmin all Gallery, Yokohama The 44th "HANATEN" Art Exhibition , Yokohama Civil Gallery, Yokohama Kanagawa Pref. Prefectual - Board of Education Award The 14th International Independent Exhibition of Prints in Kanagawa ' 88, Kanagawa Pref. Kenmin all Gallery, Yokohama 1989 The 1st Japan Grand Prix Exhibition , Tokyo Art Hall, Tokyo yo Prize for a fine work & Tobi(sponsor) Award The 1st Bharat Bhavan 'International Biennial of Prints, 1989, Roopankar Museum of Fine s Bharat Bhavan Bhopal] , India Honorable Mention: ion Award d The 57th Exhibition of the Japan Print: Association, Tokyo Metropolitan Museum, Tokyo Johichi Hoshi Award The 18th International Biennial of Graphic Art , Ljubijana , Modern Gallery, Ljubljana, Yugoslavia The Japan Print Association Prize Winners Exhibition, Gallery Rikugien, Tokyo yo The 25th Memorial Kanagawa Prefectual Art Exhibition, Kanagawa Pref. Kenmin all Gallery, Yokohama The I 5th International Independent Exhibition of Prints In Kanagawa ' 89, Kanagawa Pref. . Kenmin Hall Gallery, Yokohama The 4th International Biennial Print Exhibit, 1989 ROC, Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Taipei, ROC 1990 The 12th Exhibition of Modern Best Art , BA Chinese Modern Art Mmuseum , Ashiya , Japan The 58th Exhibition of the Japan Print Association , Tokyo Metropolitan Museum , Toky Intergrafik 90 , Berlin Ausstellungs-zentrum m Fernsehturm, Berlin, DDR Print Composition ' 90, Tama Art University. Hachioji, Tokyo tripe House Museum. Tokyo yo Interprint LVIV '90 , The Lviv Museum of the History of Religion and theism, Lviv, USSR 1991 International Print Graphics Exhibition: the collection of the Ukrainian Artists in Yokohama '91 - Ideal Art Expression, Yokohama Civil Gallery, Yokohama The 59th Exhibition of the Japan Print Association , Tokyo Metropolitan Museum , Tokyo yo Associate Members Award & recommended for membership International Print ' Triennial ' 91, Cracow, The Exhibition Hall of he Bureau for Artistic Exhibitions , Cracow, Poland The Collection of the Yokohama Civil Gallery - Tour Exhibition, Sun Heart Yokohama Asahi-Ward Kumin Culture Center, Yokohama International Print Biennial Varian ' 91 , Varna Modern Art Museum, Varna , Bulgaria The 59th Japan Print Association Prize Winners Exhibition , Gallery Rikugien, Tokyo The 27th Kanagawa Prefectual Art: Exhibition , Kanagawa Pref. Kenmin Art Center-Hall Gallery, Yokohama agreement Award Odawara, City Central public Hall, Odawara , Kanagawa Pref. Atsugi City Civil Gallery, Atsugi, Kanagawa ,Pref. l~ Iida -Seoul -Tokyo - A Phase of Modern Prints of picked 16 Artists from The 25th Modern Art Selected Exhibition sponsored by the Cultural Board, Hokkaido ,Aichi, Kanagawa , Nagano, Kanagawa ,Pref.- (Tour Exhibition) The 1st Personal Exhibition " Taisho" (.the beginning of the World) , Koshindo Gallery, Tokyo, Japan Second Bharat Bhaven International biennial of Prints 1991, Roopankar Museum of Fine Arts Bharat Bhavan Bhopal , India The 5th international Biennial Print Exhibit: 199i Roc. Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Taipei Roc. 1992 The 60th Memorial Exhibition of the Japan Print Association Tokyo Metropolitan Art museum Tokyo Japan. Fellowship to study in the United States of America under the Japanese Interprint n t ' 92 , Lviv Museum of the History of Religion, Lviv., Ukraine 1993 Pacific Rim International Print Exhibition, UHH Campus Center Gal Gallery, Hawaii USA Study program for Artist United States of America. (i993 - i997) , Printmaking workshop', Manhattan, New York 1994 INTERNATIONAL PRINT BIENNIAL , Silvermine Galleries New Canaan, CT. USA. International World Award Winners al Gallery.,Gallery of Modern Art Katowice, Poland 1995 Asian Women Artist's Assoc. of the Printmaking Workshop., Lever House Manhattan, New York. Haas Gallery of Art A Print Making Exhibition , Bloomsburg University Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania, USA NYA Grafiker-Falu Biennalen 95, Dalarnas Museum. Falu. Sweden Current Artists of the Printmaking Workshop,Provincetown. Mass. . USA 1996 Fusion: The Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop , museum of the National university. Bogota. Colombia a The Printmaking Workshop Print Collection , Hall of Fame Art Gallery. Bronx Community College. NY 1997 Inside/out; Japanese and Japanese American Artist Prints, Brandywine Invited to make prints by Brandywine Workshop
New York for me is a place of confusion. In Japan. my prints were all hand made. My subject matter then was the passage from dark to light or light to dark which was expressed in the horizontal movement of animals and humans . Arriving in New York. my sense of that world disintegrated. I could no longer continue making work in that vein. The subject of my new work is my sense of disintegration and my resolution of that experience. I am making prints from my disparate feelings and observations of being in New York. When I first came to New York. I was overwhelmed with all the different sights. smells. customs and people. Even the shapes of the people were different from what I had experienced before. Japan is a very homogeneous country. quite the opposite of New York and America. Confronted with the city and what it had to offer. I felt that I had to change my working methods. My former work was all done by hand. I changed to photo-etching because it produces a photographic image which is anonymous as to its creator. The photograph becomes the representative of the artistic vision. After a long period of confusion here. I began to look into myself. again. I am using photographic images and the choice of the subjects and the collaring of the images reflects my current state of mind.
By Shigeko Kumabe
Click the Artwork to display a larger picture.
Work #1 Animal I
Work #2 Animal II
Work #3 Searching for the Light, 1991,
81 x 180.5 cmWork #4 Melting into the Chaos, 1991,
81.x 120 cmWork #5 Harmony II, 1991,
81 x 120 cmWork #6 A Night Soverign, Luna III, 1991,
78 x 100.5 cmWork #7 Separation II, 1991,
60.5 x 95.0 cmWork #8 Sound of Stream II, 1991,
60.5 x 95.5 cmWork #9 Indication, 1990,
81 x 120.5 cmWork #10 Searching for the Light, 1989,
60.5 x 89.5 cmWork #11 Conflict II, 1988,
60.5 x 95.3 cmWork #12 A Night Sovereign, Luna, 1988,
60 x 80 cmWork #13 Blowing in the Stream, 1987,
60 x 80.3 cmWork #14 Memory of Life, Luna, 1990,
60 x 86 cmWork #15 Memory of Life, 1990, 60 x 86 cm
Work #16 Work #17 Animal III, 1990,
29.5 x 14.5 cm
Home
| About
| Private
Gallery | Public
Gallery | School
Gallery | Exhibition
Gallery
Advertisement |
Comments | Links | Store
Send mail to webmaster@art-network-today.com with
questions or comments about this web site.
Copyright © 2003 The Art Network Today, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Last modified: April 28, 2010
