Mallet - Modern & Contemporary Art, Evening Sale, Tokyo, Japan, 25 Jul

Exhibition Description:

This auction offers a wide range of paintings and prints by Japanese, American and European artists.

Highlights from the Japanese art section include works by leading contemporary artists such as Yayoi Kusama's 'Midsummer' and `Pumpkins`, as well as the recently deceased 'Gutai' painter, Kazuo Shiraga's 'Vaisravana' and 'Tomomori jusui (Blue Fudo Flame)'.

Further highlights of works by European, American and Asian artists include paintings by Maurice Utrillo, Bernard Buffet and a portfolio of 10 lithographs and screenprints by 5 great Chinese comtemporary artists, Fang Lijun, Wang Guangyi, Yue Minjun, Zeng Fanzhi, and Zhang Xiaogang 'The Giants of the Contemporary Chinese art'.

Original prints on offer include such artists as Marc Chagall, Pablo Picasso, Andy Warhol's 'Electric Chair', Joseph Beuys and Robert Rauchenberg.

Description:

Lot 49
Kazuo Shiraga
Vaisravana

signed twice (lower left and right), signed, titled and dated (on the reverse)
oil on canvas
painted in 1974
130.0 x 162.0cm
framed

estimate: 10,000,000-15,000,000JPY

This piece was created in the mid 70s by Kazuo Shiraga, who died this April at the age of 83. He was a member of Gutai, an avant-garde art group lead by Jiro Yoshiwara, in 1955. Shiraga was searching for a new mode of art that "no one has ever seen before".

He had initially been trained in the field of classical Japanese art, and became established as a distinct action painter whose style could be characterized by its dynamic flow of paint. This unique style, beautifully capturing speed of action, was achieved by painting directly with his bare feet, suspended from the ceiling with a rope.