I know Kentaro from the Art Students League, definitely check out his upcoming exhibit at Local Project in Long Island City opening on Dec. 6th.

Kentaro Fujioka / Untitled / Kentaro Fujioka / Acrylic, paper and burlap on canvas / 56 by 50 inches / 2007  / kentarofujioka.com

In this series Colors in Destruction, I’m most interested in the tension between ‘Destruction’ and ‘Construction.’ Everything is impermanent. There is the effort I make in constructing something; there is also beauty in destroying it.

Beauty appears where there is a lot of energy, no matter whether it is from something negative or positive. I have discarded the idea that destruction is negative. In fact, the act of destruction is the main method of my working on this series. Destruction simply cuts through dimensions and time. It reveals the relationship between colors which have been applied in different times and contexts. It does destroy the relationship in the present composition, but it discovers other possibilities of existence.

In the process of my work, the act of ‘Destruction’ entails the act of ‘Construction’. I start my painting with stretching raw canvas on the stretcher, then I stain the canvas and prime it. After the base structure is made, I repeat the process of layering on the surface with paint, strips of wood, paper and fabric. The choice of the color and the order is carefully made, not so much by planning, but rather by intuitive selection after a long observation on the recorded images of the previous state. The stronger the wood or paper or fabric is applied on the canvas, the higher the tension between layers becomes, it makes the effect of the torn surface more interesting. After days or sometimes weeks of layering, I intuitively stop layering. (the number of layers depends on the process of each painting, usually 20 to 30.) Then I start tearing off. This is also an intuitive process. Some part of the layers is left, while most is removed. This act of tearing off is an essential part in the process. It reveals the layers underneath, exposing colors which have been applied previously in another composition. It makes the process far more complicated so the result would never be anything I expect. Occasionally I find that I have to get rid of the canvas entirely by completely destroying it. {Read More…}

Thomas Nozkowski / Untitled (8-104) / 2008 / oil on linen on panel / 22 x 28 in. (55.9 cm x 71.1 cm) / © Thomas Nozkowski. All rights reserved. Courtesy the artist and Pace Wildenstein.

Over thirty years ago, Thomas Nozkowski made a commitment to specific decisions regarding the scale and material of his work. Although he has followed this approach persistently, painting small-scale works on canvasboard or panel for several decades, John Yau contends that Nozkowski is not interested in making “reiterations of past accomplishments. He is determined to remain open and inventive, to understand that each experience, however ordinary and meditated, is unique, and to transform that into an abstract painting.” In an interview earlier this year, Nozkowski remarked about his painting process, “I believe that what I’m doing is actually very close to our normal way of looking at and thinking about the world. We slowly build up a whole web of associations and meanings.” [Read More...]

Until May 3 at PaceWildenstein (534 W. 25th St., between Tenth and Eleventh avenues, 212-929-7000) www.pacewildenstein.com
Until April 14 at Fisher Landau Center for Art (38-27 30th Street, Long Island City, New York 11101 Telephone 718.937.0727) www.flcart.org