Kazutoshi Shimuta – TORSOHOUSE -

■ Artist Name＿ Kazutoshi Shimuta
■ Exhibition Title＿TORSOHOUSE
■ Date＿Feb.21th (sat)- Mar.21th (sat), 2009
■ Artist Talk: Feb. 20th (Fri) 19:00-20:00
■ Gallery hours: Tue-Fri 14:00-19:00, Sat 12:00-19:00 Closed: Sun, Mon, and Holidays
■ Venue＿void+ 3-16-14-1F Minami-Aoyama, Minato-Ku, Tokyo 107-0062　
Tel: 03-5411-0080 Fax: 03-5411-0053 http://www.voidplus.jp

Void+ is pleased to announce the opening of Kazutoshi Shimuta’s "TORSOHOUSE" exhibit from Saturday February 21 to March 21. Since presenting his single exhibit TORSOHOUSE in 2005, Shimuta has introduced numerous artwork using this motif. TORSOHOUSE is a sculpture of plaster molded into a small house with an entrance and a hollow interior, but as the title indicates, it is also presented as a body.
The new artwork to be presented in this exhibition appears similar to the TORSOHOUSE which he presented in the past at first glance. However, the entrance is blocked and illustrated like an illusion. When you look behind the piece, three out of the six rectangular surfaces is missing. Also, the open interior is filled with colored shadows that spill outside the piece.
The front wall of the gallery exhibits "Flesh Window," a planar piece of artwork. As indicated by the title, this work references Marcel Duchamp's "Fresh Widow." The window frames painted across the surface of the canvas can perhaps be seen as one object, while the transparent glass parts are colored black.
One ponders what this shadows symbolize. The relationship between light and shadow, interior and exterior as presented in Shimuta’s work reflects deep complex meanings entwining and adding great mystery and revealing the bottom of the world in it's primitive form to void+'s small gallery space.
In the Jewish religion, God contracted space inside his own body to create this world for humans, which is refered to as 'Tzimtzum.' In other words, this world is a house to human kind, created inside God himself. By looking we extend our physical realm. At the same time however, the body is also seen and contracts. Similarly, "TORSOHOUSE" is a passive body and a house at the same time." (Kazutoshi Shimuta)

Kazutoshi Shimuta TORSOHOUSE 2005 @ T&S HOME Gallery

photos by Takashi Mochizuki