James Cohan Gallery Shanghai presents two solo exhibitions by two of Japan's most widely admired and dynamic young artists, Yuko Murata and Fumito Urabe.

Fumito Urabe's a passage of ancient red rice suggests an epic historical journey. Using found or discarded materials, Urabe constructs small boats made out bits of driftwood and creates map-like mixed media works on paper of imaginary islands drawn with mineral pigments. Featured in this exhibition will be two of Urabe's small-scale dioramas of shanty huts accompanied by miniature ceramic pots. Also on view will be a group of crude driftwood sail boats suspended in mid-air. Commenting on his own work Urabe says, “I depict the places and subjects that belong to no one . . . the world without the owner is also a place that everyone holds. Things are owned only momentarily by human beings—the land, objects, even our own bodies: nothing belongs to us forever. The found objects I collect indicate this truth; I live a moment of forever when I relate to those mediums.” Sekihan (赤飯 or red rice) is ceremonial rice. The rice of ancient Japan had a naturally reddish color and was intimately connected to spiritual beliefs long ago, often given as an offering to the gods. While Urabe's title for his exhibition might reference these ideas, his passage of ancient red rice might well serve as a metaphor for Buddhist tales he learned as a child. “Buddha's teachings seem far from me,” says Urabe, who is the son of a Buddhist monk. “Living in contemporary society it is not possible to live without trying to possess or to take. Making work is an act of self observation. As in Buddhist scripture, where a mirror is often compared to the mind, my work is also a reflection in a mirror.”

For Yuko Murata's solo exhibition: from morning, please click here.

About the artist:

Fumito Urabe (b. 1984, Aichi) has been featured recently in "Re:emerge, Towards a New Cultural Cartography" curated by Yuko Hasegawa for the Sharjah Biennial 11, 2013, at Sharjah Art Foundation UAE, as well as his installation “The sky blue island” at the 2013 Aichi Triennale. His works are included in private and public collections, including the Sharjah Art Foundation, UAE; Takahashi Collection, Tokyo; Map Office, Hong Kong; and the Fiorucci Art Trust, London. This is his first exhibition with James Cohan Gallery Shanghai. He lives and works in Aichi, Japan.

-James Cohan Gallery

Image: © Fumito Urabe
A Passage of Ancient Red Rice
2013
Driftwood, Ceramic
Dimension variable