2002.6.5 - 9.29
Osuke Shimazaki Retrospective
Okawa Museum of Art
-描かざる幻の画家- 島崎蓊助 遺作展
大川美術館

In Lubeck / oil on canvas / 60.6×72.7cm / 1970
In Lubeck / oil on canvas / 60.6×72.7cm / 1970

(日本語は下に続きます)

From June 5th [Wed.] to September 29th [Sun.] 2002, “Osuke Shimazaki Retrospective” was held at the Okawa Museum of Art in Kiryu, Gunma Prefecture. Osuke Shimazaki (1908-1992) held his exhibition only once before his death, so almost all of his activity as an artist didn’t see the light of day. After 10 years from his death, about 100 pieces were exhibited in the retrospective. They included the oil paintings he drew when he stayed in Germany in 1970, unpublished early works, dessins, the works by his brother Keiji and the some data of his father Toson.

 

Osuke’s “Solitude” having roots in Toson’s “Melancholy inherited from parents,” got universalized and crystallized into an Art. To get there, his career as a “shadowy painter” was needed. In his career, many experiences were integrated through the trial and error after war, then it went back to the Solitude and Toson in his childehood. The experience includes the bottom of the Kiso River he gazed at all by himself in his childhood, Mt. Ena, the revelation against Toson, the burden he borne from the excitement and wandering in Germany, the reality he had to face in China.

 The sepia of the world in his eye socket was generated by the artist’s silence. He cast the world and color to society. During over 30 years after that, society has kept silence. From the works that appeared in front of us after a long interval, what can the people who look at them get from it?

( Fumihiro Sunohara, Curator of Okawa Museum of Art / from the catalogue of the exhibition )

 

An exhibition of Osuke Shimazaki was also held at HIRO GALLERY in 2010.

 

Osuke Shimazaki Exhibition -Persistence and Liberation on the Sepia-

2002年6月5日(水)から9月29日(日)にかけて、群馬県桐生市の大川美術館にて「描かざる幻の画家 島崎蓊助 遺作展」が開催されました。島崎蓊助(1908-1992)は生前には一度しか展覧会が開催されず、秘められた画家としてその活動はほとんど日の目を見ることがありませんでした。その没後10年、帯独中の油彩を主軸に、未発表の初期作品、デッサン類、さらに兄鶏二の作品と父藤村の資料の一端を含めた約100点が展示される回顧展となりました。

 

「藤村からの『親譲りの憂鬱』が起因となる蓊助の『孤独』は、普遍化され、一つの芸術を成した。そこに至るには、幼少に独り見つめた木曽川の川床と、恵那山、藤村への反抗が、そして生前のドイツで受けた刺激と彷徨の中で背負った重荷が、さらに中国で突きつけられた現実感が、戦後の試行錯誤の中で統合され、さらに原点である藤村と幼少期の孤独に回帰して行ったという、『描かざる画家』としての過程が必要であった。

 この画家の沈黙が生んだ眼窩の世界のセピア色。彼はこの世界と色を社会に問い掛けた。それから30年余り、その反響は以前沈黙のままであった。久しぶりに我々の目前に突きつけられたこれらの作品から、それを見るものは何を受け取ることができるのだろうか。」

(展覧会図録より 大川美術館学芸員 春原史寛氏)

 

当画廊におきましても2010年に島崎蓊助展を開催いたしました。

 

島崎蓊助展 セピアに込めた執着と解放

 

 

画像キャプション

市庁舎(リューベックにて) / キャンバスに油彩 / 60.6×72.7cm / 1970年