ARTIST PROFILE
Hiro Yokose By Bill Macomber Hiro Yokose’s dreamy landscapes evoke emotion more than a sense that you are looking at an actual place. This neo-romantic painter uses layers of oil paint and wax (encaustic) to suggest a misty distance. Looking through the wax to the muted colors and blurred shapes beneath, the scenes may be from a dream you once had, maybe a picture you saw long ago of an enchanted kingdom or a beautiful place someone told you about that you’ve never actually seen. Yokose also works in the purer abstract forms, often with dots or lines on a solid field of color. The fantastic thing about abstract art, especially when it suggests something in the “real world,” is that whoever is looking at the painting is asked to bring imagination to the experience. Without really knowing we’re doing it, our eyes fill in bits of information. It’s another way of drawing us into a painting. It’s easy to forget when looking at very realistic paintings that all art is artificial color on a flat surface – you’re not really looking at a lake, no matter how realistically one is articulated. You’re always looking at paint. In some ways, a lake that’s suggested can be more “real” to a viewer than one that’s completely detailed.
creates an effect that can’t really be reproduced in a magazine reprint. The wax adds atmosphere and a little distance. Because the wax is allowed to drip over the edges of the paintings, the finished works as they hang on the wall become three-dimensional objects in themselves in a way most paintings don’t. Hiro Yokose works these
effects with confident mastery. As with all good abstract art, his paintings dramatically change the space they occupy. Hiro Yokose’s paintings can be seen at Bentley Gallery, 4161 N. Marshall Way, Scottdale. 480.946.6060. www.bentleygallery.com.
Yokose’s landscapes have a lot of light in them, but the colors reflect the Japanese painting tradition of delicate, understated hues. The beeswax laid over the paintings
Hiro Yokose’s oil and beeswax paintings on woven canvas range in size from a foot square to up to 6 feet wide. Most have a depth of more than an inch. He also works in mixed media on paper.
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