This exhibition reconciled two major strains of thought
that I have pursued throughout my career. The first explores
the territory between painting and sculpture, and the second
between physical form and sound. Both of these concerns
have to do with liminality; the state of transition between
two absolutes, like twilight or adolescence. Another expression
of liminality is what is called “Ku” , or the void in Zen
philosophy. “Ku” is everything and nothing at the same time.
It is where opposites converge, and it constitutes a kind
of focus that is not attached to one absolute or another,
but floats within a broader, almost unfathomable continuum.
I learned about “Ku” through "The Book of Five Rings" , written
in 1645 by Musashi, a Zen Master, painter and ronin Samurai.
Musashi’s instruction of perception is to: “see distant
things as if they are close and take a distanced view of
close things.” To maintain this kind of focus is to exist
between; in the center; what Buddha called the middle path.
Each painting is named after each book and each book has
a sound: Go, Rin, No, Sho, Ku, (ground, water, fire, wind,
and void). The exhibition, though made up of individual
paintings, was a physical manifestation of the sequence
of these sounds. It was the entire phrase, in the round.
“The Sound of Ku” achieved the gaze of the middle path on
several levels. From a distance, the paintings are the essence
of one color, yet this essence comes to the viewer through
the build up of many colors in many layers. This sense of
opposite forces working in unison is also manifested in
the topographical aspect of each painting. Each reads as
if the surface is far away, yet, at the same time, very
close. The surface could be earth or water. The vibration
of colors as well as the relationship between the paintings
creates a kind of music through deeply felt shifts in tones,
durations, sizes, placement, and pitch. The clarity of how
all these forces come together to create one essence arrives
slowly, yet when it does arrive, it illuminates a single
moment within a vast continuum of time. As a whole, the
exhibition combines opposites: one color/ many colors, macro/micro,
solid/ liquid, silence /sound, one moment/ infinity to bring
the viewer into a state of “Ku” and allows them to hear
it through their imagination and intuitive feelings.
I’ve
come to realize that placing myself and the viewer in a
state of “Ku”, or liminality has been the argument to which
I have applied my talents as an artist from the beginning
and that this commitment is a spiritual issue, because to
hear what is silent, and to actively be a part of something
that is much larger than our lives is ultimately an act
of faith.
©Sono Osato
