kazuhiro nomura, "leonardo"


nov. 8 - dec. 20, 2003
taguchi fine art, ltd.








































Born in Kochi prefecture in 1958, Kazuhiro Nomura now resides in Kanagawa prefecture. After parting his PHD course at the Tokyo University of Arts in 1988, he moved to Germany as a DAAD exchange student.
He graduated from Dusseldorf Art Academy in 1990 and returned to Japan in 1993. Nomura's work deals with themes such as: "Words and Meaning"; "Art, System and Society"; "Whole and Parts"; "Perfect existence and Imperfect existence (model and copy)." He has been presenting works such as drawing, painting, performance, and installation that are free of categories, since he was still attending Tokyo University of Arts.
In recent years, Nomura has concentrated to show his serial painting works, painting "tree of life" on small canvases using microscopic points (dots) in five different colors. (see "Wie oft isst Eva den Apfel ?" )




Ready-made objects

At his last one person show titled "foreword" at Nantenshi Gallery this April, in addition to his recent small paintings, Nomura installed his early works, ready-made objects and documentation of his installation works and performing works.
None of these early works are known to the people, who got to know the artist with his recent small paintings, and the show brought great surprise and at the same time some confusion.
In the same way, currently on view at taguchi fine art, ltd. are his early unknown ready-made works, shown in conjunction with the publication of his artist book "leonardo", works related to "printing technique" like color xerography or using "printed matter" such as books or newspapers.




"leonardo"

"leonardo" is a work created by cutting and joining lengthwise halves of a French and a German edition of an old paperback book of Leonardo da Vinci paintings that Nomura purchased during his time in Germany.
By uniting left half of the French edition, with the right half of the German edition, and then the left half of the German edition with the right half of the French edition, Nomura brings two queer Leonardo books into the world.
Although the same publisher published each edition, there are slight differences in the position of each plate and the printing quality, which are emphasized when jointed together as one book, giving the final jointed book a very unnerving feeling.




Artists' book

Nomura has been considering publishing this jointed book work, "leonardo" as a multiple for many years. The idea was realized in cooperation with taguchi fine art, ltd. and it is published as artists' book, edition limited to 10 copies. The form of this edition as a multiple artists' book is somewhat different from that of the original jointed book, but we believe we succeeded in capturing the essence and the character of the original work. This is the second artists' book published by taguchi fine art, ltd. (the first was "farmer's pot - Rosaceae" by Yoshinobu Nakagawa in 2001.)




Followings are the data of multiple artist book, "leonardo";

printed by xerography on bel-couleure paper 70 kg, in cooperation with Art by Xerox
edition limited to 10 copies plus 3 A.P. and 1 deluxe edition
bound by Atelier la Meduse
published by taguchi fine art, ltd.




We hosted the artist's performance of "wie oft isst eva den apfel (how often does Eva eat apple) ?" - violin by Mayumi Ikeda - on the first day of the exhibition, Saturday, November 8th at 6:00 p.m.















checklist of the installation

1. Wie oft isst Eva den Apfel ?, 1990,
watercolor on newspaper

2. untitled (putty), 2003, mixed media

3. leonardo, 2003, xerography on paper

4. leonardo (deluxe edition), 2003,
xerography on paper, mixed media

5. untiteld (butterfly),1987, mixed media

6. ein heimische Voegel II, 2002, xerography on paper

7. untitled (two books), 1987, ready made object

8. untitled (home run), 1987,
xerography on paper, painted wooden frame