text by Gian Luigi Corinto
The association between the work of Kan Yasuda and the land of San Francesco is unavoidable. Yasuda was born far away from Italy in Bibai on the island of Hokkaido in 1945. In 1969 he finished a graduate school at Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music. The Italian government acknowledged the high level of Yasuda's artistic achievements by presenting him with an artist-in-residence scholarship which brought him to Italy in 1970. Over thirty years, Yasuda has continuously maintained a studio in Pietrasanta, Tuscany, world famous for its superior quality marble. Despite those years, Yasuda's ties with his native Japan still remain intact and seem to get even stronger.
It has been sixty years since the atomic bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The memory does not disappear from our thoughts even though everyday life keeps going and the human race continues to survive.
To thank heaven for being in the world and enjoying the beauty of creation, San Francesco said simply,
Praised be you, my Lord, through our Sister Mother Earth,
who sustains and governs us,
and who produces varied fruits with colored flowers and herbs.
In order to interpret the religious blessings by San Francesco now, we should recall the simplicity of the old Japanese poets who knew how to describe in short and perfect verses the astonishments a human can find when open to such minimal things as a thread of grass, a flake of snow, and a pebble smoothed by water.
Kan Yasuda is a poet who seeks for the spirit of the material with a minimalist technique. His sculptures appear to be drawn naturally from the earth. Nevertheless they have essential and pure forms and, because of this, the power of universal communication. In the land of San Francesco the works of Yasuda are a prayer for the peace rising to the sky. This is evidenced at the artist's exhibition "To love life is to create peace," which is located in front of Basilica of San Francesco in Assisi.
The four works of Kan Yasuda represent earth, water, fire, and wind. They are a most natural association with the prayer of San Francesco. Yasuda realizes simple forms, which are left carefully and full of consideration in delicate spaces. His installation work indicates modesty in the same way the prayers of San Francesco do, and also a sign of the absolute force and awareness of divine consciousness.
The natural force is the spirit of "stones" of Kan Yasuda that comes through the materials and surpasses the surfaces smoothed by the sculptor. This force is presented alive and vital in the space of Assisi, a sacred space rendering religiousness to the presence of the works and asking for contemplation and silence.
The sculptures of Kan Yasuda which are installed in public squares can be touched and climbed up over so that people perceive their poetic essence. The spirit in them is sacred like life itself and signifies a way of living in peace. With this spirit residing in Yasuda's monuments, his works also transform Assisi and establish the truly pure relation which releases the mind from negative memories.
