EXHIBITIONS

Ei Arakawa-Nash “Here Comes a Cohort, Through the Wind Tunnel”

Dates: Jul 4 – 29, 2023
Location: Taka Ishii Gallery Viewing Room (TERRADA ART COMPLEX II)
Opening reception: Friday, Jul 7, 18:00 – 20:30 (held in conjunction with TAC Gallery Night)
Opening Performance: Friday, Jul 7, 18:45 and 19:45 
Closing Performance: Saturday, Jul 29, 16:00 and 17:00
By reservation only (capacity: 20 persons)

Taka Ishii Gallery is pleased to present Ei Arakawa-Nash’s solo exhibition, “Here Comes a Cohort, Through the Wind Tunnel” from Tuesday, July 4 to Saturday, July 29. This fourth solo exhibition at the gallery features three LED paintings that incorporate sources drawn from various experimental class syllabi by internationally influential artists.

Los Angeles, which has been transformed yet again by the arrival of the annual Frieze Art Fair, has long maintained a close relationship between art schools and the art world (especially the market). I recently began teaching at ArtCenter, in the renowned graduate art department that was established forty years ago. My school became known for its active artist-teachers including Mike Kelley. As the current faculty includes numerous prominent artists, I spent the past year suffering from imposter syndrome, all the while asking myself, “How to teach art?” “How will we, the artists who teach, forthcoming generations of art students, and our ways of teaching, change with the times?” Anxiety towards job-security arose. I started to daydream the arrival of Gen Z, perhaps an ideal dream-like cohort … “Who are they? What are they here to learn?” How can I offer my instability as an artist-teacher? How to perform? During my preparation for this exhibition, I consulted four of my artist-teacher friends and acquaintances in Japan: Yuki Kimura (associate professor at Kyoto City University of Arts), Yuki Okumura (faculty member at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp), Yuichiro Tamura (associate professor at Nagoya University of Arts), Yui Yaegashi (part-time lecturer at Tama Art University). 

June 2023, Ei Arakawa-Nash

Openig Performance
“Here Comes a Cohort, Through the Wind Tunnel”
Date: Friday, July 7 at 18:45 and 19:45 (held in conjunction with TAC Gallery Night)
Location: Taka Ishii Gallery Viewing Room (TERRADA ART COMPLEX II)
Arakawa-Nash teaches art at a college in Los Angeles. Are there steps to becoming an artist? Where is there a hidden center to being an artist? How best to teach art? Gen Z art students and I will teeter, answering these questions.
Special Thanks: Junpei Fukuda, Yuki Kimura, Yuki Okumura, Contortion Studio Nugara, Yuichiro Tamura, Yui Yaegashi, Yamato Tricking Studio, Taichi Watanabe, and more.
Performance documentation will be posted at a5rkw.com after July 11th. 

Closing Performance
“Here Comes a Cohort, Through the Wind Tunnel”
Date: Saturday, July 29 at 16:00 and 17:00 (each performance is about 20 minutes)
Location: Taka Ishii Gallery Viewing Room (TERRADA ART COMPLEX II)
By reservation only (capacity: 20 persons)
Special Thanks: Junpei Fukuda, Yuki Kimura, Yuki Okumura, Daiki Mizuno, Contortion Studio Nugara, Yuichiro Tamura, Yui Yaegashi, Taichi Watanabe, and more.

Some experimental class syllabi for the 3 LED Paintings (Listed in alphabetical order)
1   Trisha Donnelly, “Sculptural Line”, San Francisco Art Institute, 2006
2   “Grand Openings”, Tsunan High School, Niigata, Japan, 2006
3   Mike Kelley, “UFOlogy”, ArtCenter College of Design, Pasadena, 1996
4   George E. Lewis, “Theorizing Improvisation”, Columbia University, New York, 2004
5   Stephen Prina, “The Films of Keanu Reeves”, ArtCenter College of Design, Pasadena, 1994
6   Sōgō Kiso Jitsugi (First Year Inclusive Core Studio), Kyoto City University of Arts, since 1971 (TBC)

Ei Arakawa-Nash (b.1977, Fukushima, Japan), currently lives and works in Los Angeles. He is a professor of the Graduate Art program at ArtCenter College of Design, Pasadena, California. Arakawa-Nash’s LED paintings archive personal and occupational evidence about relationships between performance art and society, as well as performativity and its history. In the context of contemporary art based on notions of individualism, Arakawa-Nash’s act of establishing the intersection between collaborations with other artists and the audience as his very practice can be seen as an intention to liberate his works from the subjective framework of the “self.” Arakawa-Nash also produces musical comedies on subjects such as Japanese art collectives like Jikken Kobo (Experimental Workshop), Gutai, and Fluxus.

Arakawa-Nash’s selected performances/exhibitions include Turbine Hall at Tate Modern, London (2021); Artists Space, New York (2021); Kunstverein für die Rheinlande und Westfalen, Düsseldorf (2018); Sculpture Project Münster (2017); The 9th Berlin Biennale (2016); Gwangju Biennial (2014) and Whitney Biennial, New York (2014). His works are housed in the public collections of The Museum of Modern Art, New York; The Carnegie Museum of Art (Pittsburgh); Museum Ludwig (Cologne), Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen (Düsseldorf), and Serralves (Porto).

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