From Phase Conception to Void Phase-Skin
—— Exhibition of Mono-ha Master Nobuo Sekine’s Paintings
Nobuo Sekine’s Phase-Mother Earth was first realized in October 1968 at Suma Rikyu Park in Kobe, marking the origin of Japan’s Mono-ha movement. AAEF Art Center is hosting the exhibition The Origins of Mono-ha: Focusing on Phase-Mother Earth. The first-floor gallery presents a large-scale hanging image of the same size as the original work Phase-Mother Earth (photography by Osamu Murai), while the second-floor documentation gallery also displays reproduced images of Phase-Mother Earth on the exhibition wall.
As an extension of the exhibition, we have specially curated a satellite show dedicated to Nobuo Sekine’s painting, highlighting two of the most intellectually compelling series in his artistic career: Phase Conception, an early body of work that embodies conceptual burst, and Void Phase-Skin, a later series that reflects profound philosophical depth.
Sekine provided a detailed account of his early Phase Conception series, in which he integrated topological space, Zen thought, and zero-sum game theory, building upon and extending the ideas of Conceptual Art, Minimalism, as well as the philosophies of Lucio Fontana and Yves Klein. In these series, he juxtaposed rupture, collage, and incision on a single canvas, allowing washi paper to evolve naturally in water and air, while layers of washi were covered with gold leaf and graphite to create an interplay of yin and yang.
However, the conceptual art artists’ statements and art critical reviews have largely focused on Phase-Mother Earth, while the critical framework surrounding Phase Conception has remained underexplored — even more so for the later Void Phase-Skin series.
This satellite exhibition brings these two series to light, aiming to reintroduce Sekine’s reflections on Minimalism, action painting, space and time, as well as the yin-yang dualism of Eastern philosophy, thereby reviving a chapter of art history that has long been overshadowed.
In the post-pandemic era, as the world faces uncertainties— with the United States entering Trump’s second term, Korea’s president imprisoned, and the rapid rise of AI — what insights do the beginnings and endings of Sekine’s works offer us? Ultimately, in this zero-sum game, what have we lost, and what have we gained?
A fundamental question of existence is posed to those of us who remain. After all, isn’t a great work of art, at its core, an exceptional question?
Shun at Tokyo Studio
