Year: 2023
Medium: oil on canvas
Dimensions: 72.2 x 60.6 cm (28 3/8 x 23 7/8 in.)
Acquired from Gallery TRAX, 2023
The lemon-yellow color, which Yamada frequently uses at the beginning of his work, remains visible across the canvas. Thick black lines boldly divide the pictorial field into striking sections. Inside the lines, the colors with gentle gradation from rouge to red are the most extensive. Occasionally, a vivid color of light blue peeks through the gaps where the black lines have been trimmed back. Yamada’s paintings are beautiful in their balance between the generous impression when overlooking the entire piece and the taut delicacy when gazing at the details. In this work as well, the color tones are controlled in every corner of the bold composition, so finely tuned that one wonders how many viewers would notice them. It is precisely because of this tense equilibrium in colors that the imperceptible difference creates a rich pictorial space. In addition, Yamada’s paintings as abstract expressions provide the viewer with a strong sense of the existence of a distinct space separate from reality, even though it is not depicted in a figurative manner. This impression arises from his treatment of the fields (surfaces) and strokes (lines) in his paintings like origami, as if they were opened, closed, or turned inside out. Through this approach, it can be said that Yamada’s works model free space within the constraints of pictorial flatness.
