A singular print of butterflies in dark ink on paper by Nomura Ko mounted in a period wooden frame with glass. Print or frottage on paper in a wooden frame with glass dating circa 1965.. While Nomura Kō’s work is often discussed in relation to the idealistic postwar Japanese avant-garde circles movements, his experimentation was not merely ideological. It was deeply technical. Among the most significant aspects of his practice was the incorporation of Surrealist procedures—methods derived from European modernism but adapted with distinctly Japanese sensitivity. Techniques such as frottage (rubbing textured surfaces to produce accidental forms), grattage (scraping through layers of pigment to reveal underlying structure), and other forms of transfer, abrasion, and material interruption appear throughout his most radical works. These methods introduced chance into the act of painting, disrupting the authority of the brush and destabilizing compositional control. The frame is 37 x 44.7 x 3 cm (14-1/2 x 18 x 1 inches) the work itself is 12 x 19.2 (5 x 7-3/4 inches). It is in overall excellent condition, with some minor toning typical of age. There is some minor dirtiness and age staining to the paper mat border. The frame is enclosed in a period card box.
Shipped without the frame an appropriate discount will be offered.
Nomura Ko (1927–1991) was born in Kyoto and graduated from the Nihonga Department of Kyoto Municipal College of Art in 1948. In 1950 he joined the Pan Real Art Association (until 1965), establishing himself as a significant figure in the postwar avant-garde movement in Japanese-style painting. Initially influenced by Surrealism, he shifted in the later 1950s toward abstraction and collage, employing unconventional materials such as newspaper printing molds, industrial waste, slate, and cement. From the mid 60”s he was driven beyond the framework to be a pioneer in installation exhibition, creating one-time works which allowed the room to be the frame. Through materially driven works and these later three-dimensional and spatial constructions, Nomura fundamentally redefined the physical and conceptual boundaries of Nihonga. His major exhibition history includes the aforementioned Pan Real (1950-1965), the Asahi New Artist Exhibition, the Asahi Selected Exhibition and the Contemporary Japanese Art Exhibition. Trends in Contemporary Painting (1963), and Today’s Artists ’64 (1964). From 1978 onward, he participated almost annually in the Ge Exhibition. In 1986, he was featured in A Section of Postwar Nihonga at Yamaguchi Prefectural Art Museum. A major retrospective, Kyoto Art: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow III – Nomura Ko, was held at Kyoto City Museum of Art in 1989. His work was posthumously included in The Turning Point of Postwar Nihonga at Tochigi Prefectural Museum of Fine Arts in 1993, confirming his pivotal role in transforming postwar Nihonga. Work by him is held in the collections of The Kyoto National Museum of Modern Art, Fukui Fine Arts Museum, Kariya City Art Museum, Kyoto City Kyocera Museum of Art, Meguro Museum of Art in Tokyo, Nara Prefectural Museum of Art, Osaka Nakanoshima Museum of Art, Osaka Prefectural 20th Century Art Collection, Tochigi Prefectural Museum of Art, Toyohashi City Museum of Art, Wakayama Museum of Modern Art, Yamaguchi Prefectural Art Museum, Sakuragaoka Museum, The, Kyoto University Art Museum and Kyoto City University of Arts among others.
