Rediscovered work from the estate of
Gutai artist, Minoru Onoda, will be shown for the first time outside Japan at
Frieze Masters this year.Onoda was an important figure in the third generation of the Gutai Group, and this solo display
of his paintings from the 1960s to the 1980s is drawn exclusively from his
family estate, which is represented by the Anne Mosseri-Marlio Galerie.
Minoru
Onoda was invited to join the Gutai group in 1965 after his participation
in the 3rd International Exhibition for Young Artists in Paris (1964).
He was one of the youngest members
of the group and became a regular exhibitor in their annual exhibitions in
Japan between 1965 and 1972. Onoda’s
work was included in the two key survey exhibitions, ‘Gutai: The Spirit of an Era’ at the
National Art Center Tokyo, 2012, and The Guggenheim Museum’s ‘Gutai: Splendid Playground,’ 2013.
From the
early 1960s, after he had left art school, and in reaction to the type of ‘Art
Informel’ where ‘all paintings looked like walls’, Onoda began to experiment
with newly available materials (synthetic paint and wood glue) and covered his
paintings with arrangements of blue and black dots to create optical illusions
and movement. These blossom into meticulous, multi coloured, biomorphic dot
paintings which he called ‘sky dreams’. With
these swirling, almost psychedelic paintings Onoda explored the ideas of
multiplication and mass production which he described in his manifesto,
‘Paintings of Proliferation’ (1961).
