NASUBI GALLERY JUNIOR

 

Welcome to Nasubi Gallery Junior online interactive activity!

Nasubi_gallery

Tsuyoshi Ozawa assists students in making a Nasubi Gallery Junior, Brisbane 2006

Here you can create a miniature gallery space of your own, inspired by the work of Japanese artist Tsuyoshi Ozawa.

WHAT IS THE NASUBI GALLERY?

In 1993 Tsuyoshi Ozawa opened a small portable box gallery in Tokyo, in front of a commercial gallery called the Nabisu Gallery. Ozawa named his gallery the ‘Nasubi Gallery’ (which means ‘eggplant’ in Japanese). It provided a place for emerging artists to display their work without the fees that other conventional galleries charged.

The structure of the ‘Nasubi Gallery’ was inspired by the traditional Japanese milk crate, a small blue wooden box, no larger than 35 centimetres tall, which was used for daily milk deliveries in Japan until the 1970s. Ozawa painted the interior of the box white to reference traditional art museum spaces, and he invited many emerging artists to show their work free inside his new miniature gallery.

Because of its portable size, the Nasubi Gallery has since popped up in the streets of Tokyo, bookshops, cinemas, libraries, and international art exhibitions and festivals, and many artists have shown their work in Ozawa’s gallery including Yayoi Kusama and Takashi Murakami.

APT5 NASUBI GALLERY PROJECT

As part of the Queensland Art Gallery’s ‘5th Asia-Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art’ (APT5) exhibition, Tsuyoshi Ozawa invited the participating artists to create work for the Nasubi Gallery. Twenty-eight APT5 artists created a Nasubi Gallery for the exhibition.

You can view some of the APT5 artists’ Nasubi Galleries here.

MEET THE ARTIST

Watch the video of Tsuyoshi Ozawa as he talks about creating the Nasubi Gallery. As you watch, think about the following questions:

1. Why did Ozawa create the Nasubi Gallery?

2. What is the Nasubi Gallery made from?

3. What contemporary art issues are reflected in the Nasubi Gallery?

4. Are the Nasubi Galleries in APT5, works of art or are they critical statements about the commerce of art?

5. In what locations are Nasubi Galleries installed?

Requires Quicktime Player View Tsuyoshi Ozawa video (4 minutes 38 seconds)