Using her skilled fingers as tools for folding, artist Nishimura Yuko transforms single white sheets of a special Japanese paper known as kyokushi into two dimensional panels with complex geometrical patterns. . Even the most subtle play of light across these intricate low relief surfaces endows them with an unusual energy that excites the senses well beyond visual pleasure. Her unique technical vocabulary produces an almost painterly patterned chiaroscuro that is rare in the monochromatic use of the color white.

Nishimura is a young contemporary artist from a culture internationally recognized for the production and appreciation of washi, hand made paper, and for the complex art of paper folding?a cultural tradition that contributed an important impetus in three dimensional paper sculpture which spread throughout the international art world in the late 20th century.

When asked about the major influences on her distinctively new folded paper reliefs Nishimura Yuko does not hesitate to reply, “The many unique practices of folding in traditional Japanese culture.” In addition to familiar objects such folding fans, intricate origami animals, cleverly folded envelopes and packaging, many aspects of Japanese domestic life reveal folding as the deeply embedded cultural phenomenon that Nishimura describes. For example, to compress storage and to keep them wrinkle-free, traditional Japanese clothing, like kimono, are folded in a precise manner. When they are worn, the creases of the folding are often evident, but they are correct! The interiors of traditional Japanese homes are normally small and somewhat neutral, since a few rooms are used for different layers of family life--entertainment, dining, sleeping and for work. In such minimal environments, a folding screen may designate a separate area. In order to transform the bedroom for a different use, the bedding must be carefully and quickly folded for storage. Even the nesting of lacquer bowls for food and the compact nesting of a set of portable tea ceremony utensils may be considered an extension of this seeming propensity for compressing for storage and portability in a culture where space is a premium.

However, in contrast Nishimura’s folding moves in an opposite direction; it is expansive and flowing. When creating a new design she initially experiments with several small maquettes until she has ‘fixed’ the new design in her mind and fingers. When beginning a large scale relief, without tracing a pattern she begins to fold using only her fingers and a simple creasing tool and her mental ‘template.’ As though improvising, her intuitive sense memory and her critical eye for symmetry tell her when to begin to curve a line and when to shift direction.

Nishimura says that in the act of folding the paper is strengthened, allowing her to create depth which projects the play of light and shadow on the surfaces of her reliefs into physical space, and in so doing expresses her feelings about that space.

Because the strong paper she uses exclusively is white, Nishimura considers light to be the second important medium for her work. While she initially used repeated folds to create large bold geometric shapes, such as her Stir series, recently she employs that repetition with both subtle and bold variations that produce irregular surfaces patterns. These more abstract reliefs derive from a deeper conceptual approach to the overall image, such as landscapes and water.

Determined not to be restricted by the limited size of the paper available to her, she has expanded the scale of her new reliefs by joining several modular components. For this exhibition at the Fuller she has introduced the first of these large scale works, Stream, comprised of multiple joined panels. And, for the first time, she has employed subtle perpetual changes in light sources that reveal differing ‘images’ within the same patterned surface, evoking varying moods in a single piece.

Although Nishimura does not use musical metaphors in discussing her work, relevant parallels can be made. The long flowing lines that comprise her circular shapes possess a legato, or sustained lyrical quality of movement while the rippling lines of the more abstract patterns resemble staccato or rhythmic movement. One is lead to believe, therefore, there is something of the musician as well as the poet that inhabits this young virtuoso.

William Thrasher