ART BOOMS

"With Snow Pallet 16, Toshihiko Shibuya transforms snow into a feast of unexpected shapes and vibrant colors"

The sculptural story “Snow Palette” by Japanese artist Toshihiko Shibuya has reached its 16th chapter this year.

And he did it in a site-specific installation that wasn't massive, but placed it in a prominent location: the entrance to the Contemporary Art Institute, CAI 03. It is located in Sapporo, the northernmost island of Hokkaido in Japan.

A place where it snows a lot. "Snow Pallet 16" follows the usual script. The artist places a support resembling a metal table where the falling snow settles. The shape that the white blanket takes in calmly changes constantly with the weather, with the passage of time （ from one moment to the next ）with the hour of the day, with the passage of time. season.

A monument of ephemeral beauty. To emphasize this continual change and the stunning Nordic landscape rendered unrecognizable by the winter snowfall, he paints the elements of the installation in fluorescent colours.

He projects different nuances on both the snow and the metal itself. Usually the artist assigns color to the bottom of the support top, but in "Snow Pallet 16" I used the top to maximize the installation's impact on the occupied ground.

The effect is at once theatrical and informal due to the vivid and informal tones chosen, artificially selected in a unique way and linked to the manufacturing process and the Japanese cityscape, Similar to the effects of candies, popsicles and soft drinks. The artist himself commented on this point: Displays bright pinks, yellows, oranges and blues.

So snow on objects sometimes looks like crushed ice. ” For “Snow Pallet 16”, Shibuya chose a narrow and high support (1.8m to 2.2m) with a thick top. In this way, we coordinate the birth of forests in unexpected and fragile forms. Ready to take over the change of state （from solid to liquid or vice versa）to the color.

He explained that it snowed heavily in Sapporo last winter. For this he chose a high element. It is shaped so that it will not be buried in snow even if it snows like last season. During winter there are cases when the temperature rises to positive. Therefore, the spectator can freely enjoy the spectacle of colored snowpacks on the object. Essential and vibrant,

Toshihiko Shibuya's work has strict rules. First of all, the poetic and ephemeral soul of nature must always dominate his work. On the other hand, the artist must humbly impose upon the unpredictable beauty of creation a revolution, sometimes seemingly fleeting, from hour to hour. Until it appeared in perfect splendor.

The "Snow Pallet" series, which Shibuya has performed tenaciously at the same time every year since 2011, embodies this conviction. The “Snow Pallet” is closely related to design (because of the inherent linearity of the supports placed by the artist) and architecture (how it fits into urban green spaces, how it will be used). material and color). As well as philosophy, poetry and ecology. and memory. “I strive to create works of art that resonate with nature. My land art is characteristic of Hokkaido’s northern climate and symbolizes its heavy snowfall. Art in nature is all about the weather. But I think that's how it should be.There's nothing we can do to tame nature.

The winter land art “Snow Palette” was installed mainly in the big city of Sapporo.The snow piles up to 6 meters every winter. My art is both site-specific and conveys "winter memories". ” This final statement by the artist is particularly interesting because it brings the sculptural series to an intimate, deeply personal dimension. As if to put that cyclical repetition in an abstract space. Psychological. Using their memories to evoke lost memories through nature and the atmospheric agents of previous editions, while at the same time keeping the collective memory alive, as if every spectator watched the sculptural group year after year. I can. Aspects related to the documentation needed to understand the changes in the landscape during the time the work is installed. And it will, over time, witness change.