Sadamasa Motonaga (Japanese, 1922-2011) Untitled, 1968

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Post War & Contemporary Art

By Hindman

May 4, 2021

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• Lot Description
  Sadamasa Motonaga
  (Japanese, 1922-2011)
  Untitled, 1968
  oil on canvas on board
  26 x 31 1/2 inches.
  
  Provenance:
  Tokyo Gallery, Tokyo
  
  The work is accompanied by a certificate of authenticity issued by Motonaga Archive Research Institution
  
  Lot Notes:
  Untitled, 1968 is a superb example of Sadamasa Motonaga's work during an important transitional period in his painting approach and technique. A member of Japan's vaunted Gutai movement, Motonaga, in keeping with the group's ethos, consistently explored ways to break from artistic conventions and push possibilities through his experiments with painted color. His earlier work, influenced by the Abstract Expressionists, employed varied and numerous painterly techniques, ranging from lyrically poured and dripped pigments to more active layers of thick gestural brushstrokes, most often depicting playful amorphous shapes or swirling eddies of color. Motonaga traveled to New York City for a year's stay from 1966 to 1967, a visit which proved pivotal in his practice and ultimate trajectory. During his time in the then epicenter of artmaking, Motonaga's work underwent a radical change as he became exposed to and embraced new material methods and processes. He departed from the heavy, gestural style he had previously favored and began to apply paint precisely and evenly, almost mechanically, without the visible built-up texture and impressively devoid of evidence of the artist's hand. His work from this era satisfyingly flattens as he utilizes an airbrush for systematize sprayed swathes of color, creating large singular abstract shapes, unified in saturation and surface, dually geometric and organic forms glowing and humming with vibrant auras. More minimal than the colorful palettes of his New York paintings, the sparse by intent Untitled, 1968, captivatingly accentuates the hard-edged aspects and graphic qualities of his newly adopted, immutable airbrushed painting mode. Original created as a tableau for a printed work produced for Tokyo Gallery, Untitled, 1968 has a sublime balance of matte black background contrasting with a spiraling glossy black singular shape, referencing both the looping totality of a snake and the space of a stylized solar system, capped with a pop of muted yellow, the gold or cheese prize at the end of the cyclone maze. This small yellow pinpoint a callback satellite signal, reminiscent of his earlier colorful pseudo figural orbs, yet also a bridging beacon, illuminating Motonaga's course to the solid sustained lines and otherworldly ovoid shapes that became his eventual hallmark.
  

  Condition

  
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