2011.28 From Point | DMA Staging Content Management System

GENERAL DESCRIPTION

Lee Ufan founded the Tokyo-based Mono-Ha, or “School of Things,” which developed in the 1960s. The group emphasized the fundamental materiality and physicality of objects rather than Western notions of expression or alteration. Lee began this work by mixing mineral pigment with nikawa, the animal-skin glue traditional to East Asian silk painting, and then choosing a specifically appropriate brush. While hovering over the canvas on a wooden plank, he slowly applied a daub onto the surface, beginning with a viscous blob and ending when the pigment thinned out and faded entirely. Each point is applied slowly and composed of a single layer without modification. This process is in accordance with ikkaisei or "onceness," a philosophic principle Lee developed from the Japanese ink-painting tradition of ippitsu ichiga (one brush, one painting), in which the myriad elements that make up a single stroke can never be repeated. Where the brush first makes contact with the canvas, the paint is thick, forming a 'ridge' that gradually becomes lighter in a process the artist refers to as yohaku, or the art of margins, indicating the resonance between the visible and invisible. He would then repeat the exercise over and over again, making visible each gesture and the passage of time it took to create the entire work. The From Point series introduced these new systems or processes into the artist's work and were based on the notion of lived time. The element of lived time constituted a dual process of action and structure that was highly ritualized and began with the preparation: an awareness of breath and bodily stance, and constancy in retaining the tension among brush, canvas, and mark.

Adapted from

Jeffrey Grove, DMA unpublished material, 2011.
Charles Wylie, Label text, Silence and Time, 2011.

NOTES

Silence & Time exhibition
Additional sources noted: Mika Yoshitake, "Lee Ufan," http://www.blumandpoe.com/exhibitions/lee-ufan#press1. Accessed October 16, 2015.
* Jeffrey Grove, The Hoffman Family Senior Curator of Contemporary Art, Acquisition Justification (2011.28), 2011.
* Charles Wylie, Lupe Murchison Associate Curator of Contemporary Art, "Silence and Time" DMA exhibition label copy, 2011.

Catalogue essays

Contemporary Art at the Dallas Museum of Art

Artist/designers

Lee Ufan (South Korean, b. 1936)

Cultures

Geography

Process/materials

Historical periods

1945-Present, Post World War II Japan

Individuals

Subject terms

Mono-ha

Post-minimalism

Minimalism (style)

RELATED OBJECTS

PROVENANCE

Until 2011: Lee Ufan (b. 1936)

2011:Dallas Museum of Art and The Rachofsky Collection (owned jointly), purchased through Blum & Poe, Los Angeles [1][2]

[1] See the copy of the Co-Tenancy Agreement in the Collections Records object file.

[2] See Invoice #301027 dated September 22, 2011 in the Collections Records object file.

AUDIO ASSETS

VIDEO ASSETS

IMAGE ASSETS

WEB RESOURCES

ARCHIVAL RESOURCES

FUN FACTS

TEACHING IDEAS

RULES

Apply to objects where number equals 2011.28

General Description

Lee Ufan founded the Tokyo-based Mono-Ha, or “School of Things,” which developed in the 1960s. The group emphasized the fundamental materiality and physicality of objects rather than Western notions of expression or alteration. Lee began this work by mixing mineral pigment with nikawa, the animal-skin glue traditional to East Asian silk painting, and then choosing a specifically appropriate brush. While hovering over the canvas on a wooden plank, he slowly applied a daub onto the surface, beginning with a viscous blob and ending when the pigment thinned out and faded entirely. Each point is applied slowly and composed of a single layer without modification. This process is in accordance with ikkaisei or "onceness," a philosophic principle Lee developed from the Japanese ink-painting tradition of ippitsu ichiga (one brush, one painting), in which the myriad elements that make up a single stroke can never be repeated. Where the brush first makes contact with the canvas, the paint is thick, forming a 'ridge' that gradually becomes lighter in a process the artist refers to as yohaku, or the art of margins, indicating the resonance between the visible and invisible. He would then repeat the exercise over and over again, making visible each gesture and the passage of time it took to create the entire work. The From Point series introduced these new systems or processes into the artist's work and were based on the notion of lived time. The element of lived time constituted a dual process of action and structure that was highly ritualized and began with the preparation: an awareness of breath and bodily stance, and constancy in retaining the tension among brush, canvas, and mark.