Year: 2022-2023
Medium: oil on canvas
Dimensions: 100 x 80.3 cm (39 3/8 x 31 5/8 in.)
Acquired from Biscuit Gallery, 2023
Yamada soaks the canvas with oil at the beginning of the production. The canvas, which contains sufficient oil smoothly absorbs the paint and invites randomness of spread and drip. Because of that, Yamada’s brushwork continues to move further. Yamada’s paintings do not take a specific motif but are created only by sharpening the fundamental elements of painting such as color, line depiction, and color surface. As the first impression of this work, the thick and straight black lines dynamically run across the painting, they largely bisect the contrasting red and blue colors. Indeed, by using only simple and basic techniques, Yamada’s power and expressiveness are demonstrated. It is what this work is about. The human eye is something that can be easily deceived. However, upon a closer look at this work carefully, one will gradually realize the colors which appear to be simply red and blue, are precisely adjusted in their details of hue, lightness, and saturation. The smooth gradation of light and shade, the purple that connects red and blue, and the minimal yet efficient use of these elements create a twisted spatiality on the canvas. Moreover, the whimsical accent colors of yellow and green appear to be fragmentary, but they are powerful enough to set the character of the work. It is important to realize that the small, yet vivid yellow color was not “added” later but was intentionally “left” as part of the painting. Yamada’s works have multiple layers of paint, but they do not involve additive composition. Instead, it is crucial to understand that they are created through subtractive thinking by blotting out or leaving the colors and images that are already there. Yamada invites the viewer to trace the process and the outcome of what he sought to erase and aim to achieve by adding.
