Yasuda Kan
In the past, the questions the public asked when looking at certain unconventional works of art were, But is this art or isn't it?» or «What does this mean ?».
Nobody asks questions like that anymore. Today people know that there are works of art that «represent» something and works of art that stimulate the imagination. We remain entranced before this type of work of art, observing it and studying it. It seems as though we are seeing something spontaneous or natural, as though it were something that had always existed, as a product of nature.
Then, looking at it carefully, we discover that these sculptures do not have a dimension and in certain cases do not seem to have any weight (also because a part of the work does not touch the ground at its base). We lose the sense of size: they could be as large as mountains or pocket-sized. They are at home in the midst of nature. They are like stones that have no front or back, or even right and left. Any side can be the front, and the sun plays on the different surfaces with the rays of light and shadows (as though this works of art were made exclusively for the sun). The light moves slowly on the «thing», creating tricks of shadows and angles of light in such a way as to vary the appearance of the «thing».
Other plastic forms of Kan resemble doors and passages, but we do not know if there is an outside or an inside. As in the old Japanese houses made of wood, straw, and paper, which are absolutely neutral and without a facade or with a facade on every side, the interior is the exterior, the exterior penetrates the home, and the infinite has no exterior. The door is open and is in the midst of trees just as a dwarf tree is (temporarily) in the home, between the sliding walls. The clouds pass over these sculptures in a very matter of fact way, and the raindrops happily run down them, hopping and jumping as they go. We, too, along with the sculptures of Yasuda Kan, are part of nature. It is better to let ourselves go with the sun and the rain.
A work of art that represents nothing is a work of art that contains everything. There is not just one «meaning» but there are a hundred thousand stimuli depending on the moment.
Bruno Munari
1991
