Kikuo Saito: Various Others 2022 in collaboration with James Fuentes Gallery
Galerie Rüdiger Schöttle and James Fuentes Gallery are pleased to present a solo exhibition of works by the Japanese-born American artist Kikuo Saito (1939-2016) drawn from the artist’s estate. This is the gallery’s first exhibition with the artist’s estate. Often overlooked in canonical art historical discourses during his lifetime, Saito’s work is rooted in the tradition of American Color Field Painting after Helen Frankenthaler and Kenneth Noland, as well as Abstract Expressionism and Lyrical Abstraction. Significantly informed by his personal experience with experimental theater and his own inter- and intracultural biography, Saito’s gestural works reflect the dialogic relationship between painting and performance while exploring ways in which painting, similar to
theater, can solidify action and emotion. Upon migrating to New York in 1966, the artist initially turned to the performative. At “La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club”, he designed sets, costumes, lighting and props, and developed stage productions that combined the qualities of the Japanese avant-garde with his
own reduced aesthetic. He later worked with noted theater directors Robert Wilson and Jerome Robbins on national and international productions. After several years of fruitful mutual influence between the two spheres, Saito devoted himself entirely to painting beginning in 1979. The graceful movements, concise forms and lighting qualities of stage productions had a lasting impact on Saito’s painting practice.
