ARTEZINE

-- A Cyberspace Review Of The Arts

Volume 23.02
July 12, 2016

Ken Hiratsuka In Space

Ball 9

Ken Hiratsuka's latest work, provocatively named 'Balls', appeared briefly at the Infinito Gallery on Leonard Street last month. Some of the work will also appear at The Curator Gallery, Chelsea, from July 14 until in a show called 'Out Of Exile', celebrating three street artists of the '80s. (There will be an opening July 13 at 6 PM; the gallery is at 520 West 23d Street.)

Before the Opening

This remarkable new work consists mostly of of rather regular oblate spheroids of modest size, mostly polished, in which his customary endless lines have been inscribed. This is something of a departure from his previous attentions to living rock, stones set in sitewalks and walls, and irregular found pieces. These spheroids had mostly been prepared for him according to his specifications, rather than accepted as-is from nature or the chances of civilization. Hiratsuka has been working with small spherical objects going back to the 1970s, but these have been less prominent in his work.

He has spoken of 'drawing one line around the world'; In this case, while working on the current planet, he has created a series of numerous new worlds like an assemblage of planetary bodies. One feels that they ought to have names, like the planets and the asteroids, but the artist says he hasn't named many of them yet. Perhaps this is a sign for collectors to step forward and adopt and name some of them.

Liquid Sun (acrylic paint and graphite pencil on paper)

Besides the stones, Hiratsuka also showed a number of drawings at Infinito. These were made with a graphite pencil used with substantial pressure on soft watercolor paper which had been prepared with black paint, so that the graphite remained inscribed in shiny grooves, giving an intaglio effect rather similar to the work in stone. Just as one might see Hiratsuka's sculpture as a kind of drawing on stone, so these drawings seem to be a sort of carving in paper. Both emanate the same powerful, abstract, mysterious, highly focused, mandala-type aesthetic.

Hiratsuka's work has appeared in Artezine before: see Artezine No. 10 for some background on his work, including pictures of his studio in Andes, New York. A wealth of more up-to-date material can be found on his web site.

Ball 9 with admirer

Links:
Infinito Gallery
Infinito Gallery, Ken Hiratsuka show
The Curator Gallery
Kenichi Hiratsuka web site

text by Gordon Fitch, 2016

photgraphs courtesy of Ken Hiratsuka, 2016

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ETAOIN
July 12, 2016