Kohei Nawa

executed in 2008

SCAI the Bathhouse, Tokyo
Acquired by the present owner from the above
Private Asian Collection

Taiwan, Taipei, Animamix Biennial: Visual Attract & Attack, Museum of Contemporary Art Taipei, 5 December, 2009 – 31 January, 2010, pp. 120-121

This work is generally in good condition.
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The Gracefulness of Pixelizing
Kohei Nawa

In the preface to his solo exhibition “Kohei Nawa – SYNTHESIS” at Tokyo’s SCAI THE BATHHOUSE, Kohei Nawa boldly concludes, “As a creator I continue to be drawn to these ‘puzzles without solutions.’ No one can predict when, what, and how things will lead to new art.”¹This unique outlook to art, of “unlocking” secret elements within an object to create a new art form, is precisely what has attracted international recognition for Nawa’s artwork—an oeuvre which spans across diverse media, filled with pioneering concepts. Having exhibited his work across the globe, at prominent institutions including the Maison Hermès in Tokyo, the Galerie Vera in Hamburg, and at the Asia Pacific Triennial in Brisbane, it is an unquestionable fact that Nawa’s art has universal appeal. Moreover, Kohei Nawa’s recent participation in SCAI THE BATHHOUSE’s 25^th anniversary show, “Making Links: 25 Years”, further solidifies his international renown, exhibiting alongside global artists of unparalleled importance, such as Lee Ufan, Takashi Murakami, and Anish Kapoor. The present lot on offer, PixCell-Elk (Lot 1057)is a highly representative and mesmerising work, and which was first exhibited at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Taipei in 2009.

Kohei Nawa is first and foremost a sculptor—albeit one with a twist. After graduating from Kyoto City University in 1998 with a BA in Fine Art Sculpture, Nawa spent a year at the Royal College of Art studying at a sculptural exchange programme. Between 1998 and 2003 he further pursued an MA, then a PhD in Fine Art Sculpture, followed by travelling and working between New York, Berlin and Japan. The current lot on offer comes from the artist’s sculptural PixCell series, a concept that he has been developing for more than a decade. The first prototype was exhibited at SCAI THE BATHHOUSE in 2010, when Nawa covered taxidermy deer with crystal glass spheres in a series initially called PixCell-Double Deer. Seeking to destabilise his audience’s reception of the original deer, this series interrogated our concept of perception.

PixCell-Elk is an advanced development of its predecessor, delving deeper into the motifs first laid out in the 2010 exhibition. Created in 2008, PixCell-Elk is multifarious in its philosophy; a refined expression of the artist’s working style. Nawa begins with a search for a taxidermy animal from online websites, acquiring the animal, before covering it in glass beads of varying sizes. According to the artist, “our involvement with the outside world (the world) is through our senses and our bodies. We are aware of what our senses perceive, and call it ‘reality.’”² However, the artist believes that when this reality is ambiguous or is cause for uncertainty, we struggle to “possess” it, to acquire it, much like how taxidermy as an art form exists in order to “possess” movement. Be it elk or deer, ensconcing the original animal under glass beads destabilises our ability to “store” the object, blurring our understanding and perception.

This highly intriguing phenomenon is likewise captured in the naming of the series: PixCell, an amalgamation of the words “Pixel” (picture element) and “Cell”. Nawa first experiences the taxidermy in the form of an image, or, a group of pixels, on his computer screen. The next stage, which is the procurement of the animal itself, “is akin to physically downloading the object to my studio.”³ He then covers the surface of the object with crystal beads, reformatting it into a PixCell work. In doing so, the crystals act like lenses through which to experience the object, so that our perception of the animal is both a magnification of specific parts, as well as its form of beads as a whole.

The British sculptor Antony Gormley has likewise experimented with spherical forms, producing amorphous objects using forged ball bearings (fig.1). According to the artist, his works delve into the relationship between mass and space; of chaos and order. Similarly, Nawa’s PixCell BEAD works, such as PixCell-Elk, investigate the notion of mass and space, yet in a much more detailed and internal manner. Rather than simply suggest mass and form such as in Gormley’s works, Nawa discernibly presents the elk’s form. Yet in its crystal casing, the elk exists paradoxically: it is both a representation of the elk, as well as the elk itself, which acts as a powerful metaphor for the very nature of taxidermy.  

The form of the elk is also undeniably beautiful and graceful. Covered in captivating crystal beads, the elk emits an aura of otherworldliness, as if it is glowing from within. This radiance is not unlike the kind shown in religious Shinto deer paintings. In Shinto belief, deer are considered to be sacred messengers of deities, and are often depicted in mandalas (a Hindu or Buddhist symbol representing the universe, in the form of a circle within a square with four gates). The deer always appear to emanate a holy glow, much like PixCell-Elk does, with its enthralling transparent crystal encasing. The overall effect is exquisite, as if the elk is merely an ephemeral mirage.

Kohei Nawa’s PixCell artworks are convergences of pixels and cells: the simplest forms of both the digital and organic worlds. In PixCell-Elk, the lines between form and content are blurred, creating a mesmeric piece that is representative of Nawa’s oeuvre. As a sculptor, Nawa exhibits the unique ability to fuse fascinating concepts with diverse materials, creating works that are in equal parts contemplative and aesthetically alluring; delicate but structurally sound. As an artist, it is thus no doubt that Kohei Nawa will continue to play a key role on the stage of Contemporary Asian Art.  

¹Kohei Nawa – Synthesis  (Tokyo: Tokyo Metropolitan Foundation for History and Culture, Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, 2011), p.83.
²Kohei Nawa – Synthesis  (Tokyo: Tokyo Metropolitan Foundation for History and Culture, Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, 2011), p.82.
³Refer to 2