Rainbow

What is remarkable about art defies language. The aesthetic experience is without words, like a human encounter that touches us at our core. Etsu Egami is interested in the fringes of communication, where the communication of thoughts and feelings threatens to fail, where forms become illegible. This is where she applies her brush with a calligraphic, rough style. She applies almost translucent oil paint to the canvas to create shadowy faces that melt into abstraction and abstract shapes that form a face for a moment in the corner of the eye. Painting is a physical, performative act for Egami, the brush is her extended arm, which creates a picture in rhythmic, sweeping sweeps. Her movements are transferred to us when we look at the work: first the eyes begin to wander, then the body stirs, and finally the mind also swings to the rhythm of the brush. This catalog brings together Egami's most outstanding works; it is a universal invitation to an idiosyncratic dance, an arc of the senses that the artist spans across all barriers to understanding.