Suda Kokuta: Abstractions

Shibunkaku Online Shop presents an exhibition of the abstract works of Suda Kokuta (1906–1990). Suda, who garnered steadily growing recognition in Japan and internationally throughout the postwar period, has been a fixture of the Kansai art scene since his move there in the early 1940s. Well-connected to other artists, including Yoshihara Jirō, Morita Shiryū, Hasegawa Saburō or Tsutaka Waichi, Suda nevertheless was an individualist who went his own way (declining Yoshihara’s offer to join Gutai, for instance).
 
Suda worked in abstraction from around 1948/9 to the late 1970s, before returning to figurative painting. The dated works in this exhibition range from 1959 to 1965, and most of the featured works stem from during or around the 1960s, showcasing thirty-five paintings that embody Suda’s experimental approach to composition, texture and surface manipulation.