Place: JaNet Hall
2 West 47th Street, 7th Floor, New York, NY 10036
On Exhibit: Saturday, September 10 through Monday, October 3, 2011
Time: Monday to Friday, 11:00 am to 6:00 pm
*early closing on some days
Opening Reception: Saturday, September 10th, 5:00-7:30 pm
Join us for a new exhibition titled, “New Constellation,” by two artists, Yumiko Furukawa and Mael Nohara, at the new multi-purpose space in JaNet Hall, located off Fifth Avenue in the diamond district of Manhattan.
The two artists met through “Igyoshu Kouryuukai (Name Card Exchange Party for Different Professions)” sponsored by JaNet, as they have inspired each other and developed a bond over the years, while going on a trip to Art Basel Miami Beach together.
Furukawa, working with watercolor, oil and acrylics, composes paintings with jewel-like color and texture. While Nohara, wielding a digital brush, produces ethereal portraits on her computer screen, where the glowing pixels flow like lava.
The exhibit aims to contrast the two worlds of analogue and digital, as the two worlds collide and meld at the same time into a shining new constellation of each artist’s work.
Born in Aizuwakamatsu City in Fukushima, she now calls New York home. Yumiko joined the International Residency Program of Location One in SoHo as a grant recipient of Asian Cultural Council in 2004. After receiving Ph.D. from Tokyo University of the arts’s graduate program, she returned to the United States as an artist and researcher with a support of the Agency for Cultural Affairs, Japanese Government in 2007. She has remained in New York since, creating installation pieces in paintings and sculptures that bridges visual and literary expressions. One of her major exhibits included Echigo-Tsumari Art Triennial 2003 and her solo exhibit titled, “Flicker” at Gallery Side 2 in 2006. She is scheduled to join the exhibit at Aizu Urushi Art festival 2011 : Yell to Tohoku sponsored by Fukushima Museum, where she is preparing a huge serpents sculpture and lacquered tea bowl adorned with the theme from local folklore.
http://www.yumikofurukawa.com/
Born in Tokyo’s Chiyoda Ward and raised in Yokohama, Kanagawa Prefecture, she grew up immersed in subcultures such as manga, anime and rock’n’roll music. While working as a professional illustrator in Japan for various media including op-ed pieces and advertisings, she was active in group exhibit circuit and commercial art for a theater group, receiving numerous awards. After moving to the United States in 2001, she started employing calligraphy techniques as she showed her works at Sci-Fi/fantasy/game conventions in and around US. Her first solo exhibit took place in 2005 in New York. Later, she switched from analogue paintings to digital using pen tablet in 2008, but continues her works in haunting fantasy-based portraitures that are both homage and her own creation.