Sadamasa Motonaga (1922 - 2011)

Sadamasa Motonaga was a self-taught artist who joined the Gutai Art Association in 1955, one year after its formation. He participated in all Gutai exhibitions until 1971. Early in his career, with little money to invest in materials, he experimented with inexpensive, non-art mediums and found objects such as wood, rocks, water, plastics, and nails. In 1954 he started to depict cartoon-like forms in dense oil paint, but by 1957 he was experimenting with pouring and dripping bright pigments onto canvas, allowing the colours to mingle.

In 1966 Motonaga was invited by the Japan Society to take up a year-long residency program in New York. While there, he began experimenting with airbrushing techniques which had a dramatic impact on his style. His previous amorphous poured canvases changed into more defined shapes with hard edges, playful colour and gradation allowed by the new technique.

For a similar work Seems White Light is Emerging, 1979 in The National Museum of Art, Osaka, go to: http:/search.artmuseums.go.jp/search_e/records.php?sakuhin=50256