In 1995, we invited Michel Henry to Japan for the first time and held an exhibition at Nihonbashi Tokyu Department Store and Tokyu Toyoko Department Store. At the same time, Karuizawa Prince Shopping Plaza opened in July and our company exhibited at Gallery Vingt de France there. It was a landmark year for our company, setting the stage for the next 20 years.
I had hoped to have Michel Henry visit Japan in 1996 as well, but it took a lot of effort to arrange the schedule as it coincided with the November Salon d'Automne, where Michel Henry served as vice-president.
The city of Calvi in the capital of Corsica has decided to hold the Calvi Contemporary Art Exhibition every year, with Michel Henry appointed as the exhibition's chairman. The first Calvi Contemporary Art Exhibition will be held, and the schedule is now being adjusted.
Department store exhibitions are planned and preparations begin one to six months in advance. Even in the spring, there was still no response from Michel Henry about his visit to Japan. I went to Paris in May and met Michel Henry.
I was relieved to hear that Michel Henry liked Japan and highly evaluated my work. I thought that Michel Henry's paintings were of higher quality than those of my colleague Buffet and my junior, Cassignol.
Buffet and Cassignol had their own galleries in Paris since the 1970s, and the Japanese agents of the French printmaking company Vision Nouvelle and Tamenaga Gallery were in Japan. At the time, Michel Henry was an exclusive artist at the American Findlay Gallery, which was next to the Tamenaga Gallery in Paris, and he traveled to the US every year, so neither Tamenaga Gallery nor Vision Nouvelle handled him. He was not as well known in Japan as Buffet or Cassignol.
I wanted the Japanese people to recognize the value of Michel Henry, and since Michel Henry is a smart person with a good understanding of business, I told him that I wanted to come to Japan every year to cooperate with him in order to realize my passion.
Michel Henry's paintings are excellent in every pictorial sense.
1: Composition: The painting is very large and has a stable, classical composition.
2: Color: Buffet uses a well-balanced mix of radiant colors close to primary colors, so the colors do not lose their brilliance. Even when similar colors are layered on top of each other, each color is beautiful. He can paint with a variety of colors as dominant colors, such as red, yellow, blue, green, and brown, giving colors a sense of transparency and a jewel-like shine. In other words, he can use a variety of colors. One day, Michel Henry's teacher, Plan Midi, saw Michel Henry using red as a bright color (red is usually considered a dark color), and said, "Michel Henry has surpassed me." Buffet is characterized by his drawings and simplified, cartoon-like expressions, but his colors are poorly expressed.
3: Matière: Matière refers to the brush strokes, the texture of the painting. It is a different concept from touch. Cassignol and Buffet paint paintings with flat surfaces that do not give much of a matière feel. Japanese paintings also have flat surfaces, so Japanese people who are used to seeing Japanese paintings do not feel strange to Cassignol or Buffet paintings that have no sense of matière, but those who are used to seeing post-Impressionist Western paintings find them lacking. Michel Henry creates beautiful matières.
4: Intention: Paintings are created according to the artist's intention. Artists always put together their art with an awareness of what they are creating, what they want the viewer to feel, and what they want to express. Without that, it is just a mechanical task of sketching and applying paint. That is where the difference between an artist and a craftsman lies. Michel Henry's paintings have an intentional beauty. Each painting is so different that it cannot be expressed in a single word, but each painting has its own unique beauty. It is expressed as a result of the artist's own inspiration, intention, devising, and trying.
In other words, Michel Henry's paintings excel in all pictorial elements.
Having spoken intimately with Michel Henry, he came to trust me even more as he saw how accurately I understood his paintings.
I left Paris with Michel Henry saying that he would contact me after adjusting the schedule.
In July, Michel Henry contacted me and decided to come to Japan in November, but since Michel Henry's visit was only in April, it would be difficult to organize a department store event. Apparently, Michel Henry resigned from his position as vice president of Salon d'Automne in order to come to Japan.
This year, the exhibition will be held at Gallery Adeka in Sunshine, Gallery Vingt de France in Karuizawa Prince Shopping Plaza, and Chiba Parco.