masako kamiya

Membership Info

Last Name

kamiya

First Name

masako

Statement

In my painting, I engage in a dialogue with paint. My statement is composed of each dot I make with the brush. It requires me to work intimately on the surface, and yet I also move away from the surface in order to see how the layers of mark-making negate earlier marks and reveal a new form. This process is an interchange with the painting activity. In this way, I slowly arrive at my own truth, which is visual satisfaction.

My painting is gouache on a wood panel or on a watercolor paper. I build up dots of color into half-inch, stalactite-like columns with rich variation in color layers. From a distance the painting is a series of dots, which create larger patterns toward a uniformed center. When observed more closely the third dimension is revealed, a forest of multicolored columns. The surace is dense. Colors on the flat surface of the panel or the paper react with the colors on the surface of each stalk when perceived closely.

I challenge the way a painting is conventionally perceived. The sculptural surface moves viewers across the field of the painting. This forces the viewer's eyes to mix and optically process the various properties of color. Ultimately, the viewers experience the subtle metamorphosis of the color in the paintings as the painting shifts from two dimensions to three dimensions and back again, according to the viewer's angle to and distance from the work.

Painting to me is a speculative and negotiable activity. It has become even more critical to the way I make art and serve as a counterpoint to my experience of seeing in today's world; visual stimulation is more fast-moving and superficial with the advent of the high speed Internet and digital technology.