Press Release(PDF)

A “wink” is a little gesture that one makes in order to make a hint or suggestion, or to convey some kind of message or idea. Painters sometimes do it during the creative process in front of the painting they are working on. The purpose here is to look at it with one eye only, so that the canvas, a three-dimensional object, appears two-dimensionally. This is how one can spot defects in the overall composition, proportions or color balance. In other words, winking means taking a step back from the work, to detect problems or errors from an objective point of view. It is a process of creation and correction that is repeated until the painting is completed.

The complexity of contemporary social life makes it increasingly difficult to grasp the big picture. As a result, people are divided by extreme, opposing views and values, and such polarization sometimes triggers serious problems. Just like painters examine their work with one eye, we should address social problems from a similar, neutral point of view, and keep fixing things and restore the balance, to create a better society. The idea behind the title, “Wink,” was to communicate the artist’s feelings of hope in this respect.

The new paintings that are exhibited here, are vertically divided into two halves. One half is dominated by the dynamic feel of brushstrokes, including roughly or not at all painted areas. This emphasizes the material quality and texture of the canvas, and also stimulates the viewer’s creativity and involvement. The other half is dedicated to the method of “subtraction” that Komura has been employing in recent years. Here the brushstrokes are completely wiped out, and what emerges instead is a beauty of stillness. These works can be understood as a response to the “Horizon” series of paintings that are horizontally divided into two different halves, which the artist unveiled in 2021. While the emphasis is on the stark contrasts within the individual paintings, there is always also a balance, and an underlying message that conveys Komura’s problem awareness and hope.