CRITICS

Reflections / Riflessioni – Bruno Munari

One perceives of a three-dimensional work by looking at the overall form, following along the surface, the various surfaces, following how the various elements have been put together. Thus one has the perception of the work as a whole. But actually, if the work is made of some opaque material, we only perceive it by looking over the visible surfaces, possibly moving around a three-dimensional work. The work could even be hollow, like some large sculptures, or even accessible to visitors.
One looks at Ōki Izumi’s work differently. The material used is transparent and colourless, one see right through it, one sees certain curving forms in some works which actually are made of air, air pockets we can perceive formally like three- dimensional objects. Ōki doesn’t use opaque materials; she use a cold, invisible material, panes of glasses. She composes three-dimensional models where our view can penetrate inside and even see across it; this is another way of composing and perceiving. This stone-hard material, cold and impenetrable, allows us to perceive the exterior and interior of a work, its structure, the consistently transparent elements by which it is formed.
A glass object moreover is highly sensitive to the light of its surroundings; the direction and the intensity of the light determine suggestive effects of reflection , transparency and chromatic flashes.
Glass is a material loaded with great communicative potential; it is invisible and yet impenetrable; you’re never quite sure it’s there, it is a material which both reflects and leads one to reflect.

January 1994