 Review
by Paul
Mihas,
the writer
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on images
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Enchanting
Mindscapes:
The Explosion
of Color
and Secret
Symbols
 Jun
Ishida's
art invites
you to
an enchanting
realm
where
figures
from Buddhist
iconography
commingle
with haiku
poems,
Chinese
Buddhist
mantras,
and Tibetan
secret
symbols.
Here is
a celebration
of color
and the
gathering
place
of rabbits,
storms,
fish,
and fragments
of poems
in both
Japanese
and English.
Ishida's
canvases,
teeming
with life,
bring
to mind
fertility
and the
glory
of the
present
moment.
His most
provocative
paintings
incorporate
a high
level
of detail
and offer
unusual
perspectives
-- from
beneath
a tree
looking
at a spray
of branches
-- and
a collage-like
effect
of powerful
images
-- flames,
bull's
horns,
and floating
poems.
In bringing
to life
Asian
imagery
in all
its elegance,
the artist
invites
the viewer
to experience
the immediate
sensation
of color
and fantasy
while
the lingering
eye will
attempt
to decipher
the layers
of meaning
and paint.
 "Darling
Can We?
Spring
Stream"
emits
a mysterious
gleam
that transcends
representational
water.
An unleashing
of the
imagination,
this work
evokes
a place
mesmerizing
in its
blending
of branches
and blossoms
with a
more stylized
stream.
The cascade
of white
blossoms
interwoven
with the
abstract
combines
naturalistic
depth
with flat
images.
Unifying
the idiosyncratic
with the
abstract
is also
evident
in "Seeking
the State
of Samadhi,"
an imaginative
feast
of floating
flowers
in resplendent
color,
a backdrop
of neither
water
nor air
but suggestive
of both.
"Be
a Master
of Your
Mind"
is an
abstract
braiding
of colors,
a colorized
DNA-like
strand
of spontaneous
energy.
This work
is so
evocative
in its
detail
that it
seems
made of
thread
and light
rather
than paint.
The web
of connections
in all
these
works
unites
the concrete
-- the
moon or
a leaf
-- with
the elusive
spirit
that permeates
them.
The shared
conversation
between
artist
and subject
is evident
in the
works'
arousing
titles,
sometimes
imperatives
or questions
that invite
us to
surrender
to an
abundance
larger
than the
canvas.
 Some
of the
canvases
are mindscapes,
like "Thought
in the
Dark"
-- that
conjure
states
of being
in color
and copious
detail,
the abstract
merged
with the
representational.
Integrating
these
dualisms,
Ishida's
paintings
are a
magic
carpet
ride to
a sometimes
surreal
terrain,
where
the simplest
object
-- an
avocado,
a candle,
a lotus
flower
-- is
suffused
with an
uncommon
radiance.
In pursuing
the dignity
of the
beautiful,
Ishida's
work pays
homage
to East
Asian
art, but
also uncovers
the unexpected
with carefully
captured
forms
that inhabit
a highly
charged
landscape.
>>Another
review
by David
Tabacnick,
the poet
|
