Rinko Kawauchi, one of Japan’s most important and celebrated contemporary photographers, opens her first museum exhibition in the United States at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts . It features a unique installation of 42 photographs selected from her series, Illuminance. Kawauchi’s photographs capture ordinary, fleeting moments of light and daily life and transform them into something extraordinary. On view February 20 through August 10, the exhibition is the latest installation of the museum’s contemporary photography series, “New Pictures.”

The Illuminance series mingles light and dark, beauty and sadness, and life and death in momentary scenes—from a solar eclipse, to refracting light, to a deer struck by a car. Widely recognized for nuanced, lushly colored images, Kawauchi views the world with a curiosity that is thought provoking, at times playful, critically detached, but always empathetic. Her distinctive style of presenting everyday scenes shot in a way that illuminates the wonderment of life has distinguished her work since her critically acclaimed debut in 2001.

Born in Shiga, Japan, in 1972, Rinko Kawauchi lives and works in Tokyo. She discovered photography while studying at Seian Junior College of Art and Design. In 2001 she simultaneously released a series of three photographic books–Utatani, Hanabi, Hanako—which created an overnight sensation in the photography world in Japan. To date, she has published 15 photo books, including two 2012 publications: Light and Shadow and Illuminance, Ametsuchi, Seeing Shadow. Her works have been shown in individual exhibitions all over the world, including at the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, Sao Paulo Museum of Modern Art, and the Foundation Cartier pour l’art in Paris.

Rinko Kawauchi, Japanese, born 1972, Untitled, 2007–11 Chromogenic prints Courtesy of artist Minneapolis Institute of Arts

Rinko Kawauchi, Japanese, born 1972, Untitled, 2007–11 Chromogenic prints Courtesy of artist Minneapolis Institute of Arts

New Pictures 9: Rinko Kawauchi, ‘Illuminance’
February 20, 2014 – August 10, 2014
Minneapolis Institute of Arts
Minneapolis, MN

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“Graphicstudio: Uncommon Practice at USF” is the most ambitious and comprehensive show to feature works from the workshop since the survey exhibition of the early years of Graphicstudio at the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C. in 1991. The exhibit features forty-five years of more than 110 original works by an international array of 45 of the 108 artists who have worked in residence at Graphicstudio.

On view February 1 through May 18, 2014, this exhibition was co-organized by the Tampa Museum of Art and the USF Contemporary Art Museum and curated by Jade Dellinger.

Highlighting both technical and conceptual breakthroughs, the exhibition includes seminal works spanning Graphicstudio’s forty-five year history (by Robert Rauschenberg, Jim Rosenquist, Ed Ruscha, Allan McCollum, Louise Bourgeois, Jim Dine, and others) with some of its most recent collaborative endeavors by (Christian Marclay, Mark Dion, Teresita Fernández, Los Carpinteros, and Trenton Doyle Hancock).

According to Margaret Miller, the Director of Institute for Research in Art – Contemporary Art Museum and Graphicstudio, the exhibition is an opportunity for viewers to see a survey of works that represent leading international artists and affirms that printmaking is a primary medium for many contemporary artists. The exhibition chronicles several aesthetic and technical conversations among artists of different generations. Often times, it is the invention of a new technology that transfixes the artists in residence. As former director, Alan Eaker noted, “It has always been the primary concern of Graphicstudio to make art that was phenomenal and along the way develop the technology to accomplish it.”

Founded in 1968 as a non-profit, university-based, collaborative art making facility, Graphicstudio remains unique in its commitment to aesthetic and technical research in the visual arts. Leading artists are invited to work in the state-of-the-art studios in collaboration with expert artisans to create works on paper – including lithographs, etchings, photogravures, digital images, books – and sculpture multiples in a variety of materials.

Chuck Close Self Portrait/Photogravure, 54 1/4″ x 40 5/8″ (2005) copyright USF Graphicstudio Photo: Will Lytch

Vic Muniz Jorge photogravure on silk colle 52 1/4″ x 41 1/2″ 2003 copyright USF Graphicstudio Photo: Will Lytch

Christian Marclay Actions: Skutch! Splash! (No.1) hand painting by artist with screenprint copyright USF Graphicstudio Photo: Will Lytch

Courtesy of the artist and Marianne Boesky Gallery, NY copyright Diana-Al-Hadid Photo: Jason Wyche

“Graphicstudio: Uncommon Practice at USF”
February 1, 2014 – May 18, 2014
Tampa Museum of Art
Tampa, Florida

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