[Fetisch, Kitsch and Eroticism] the work of Kyoichi Tsuzuki
Fetisch, Kitsch and Eroticism - the Artistic Value
For his book Tokyo Style Kyoichi TSUZUKI portrayed many interiors in Tokyo during the early Nineties. Together, they formed a certain style. But after looking at all his pictures, I can say that the relation between the original space [eg. the straight grid of the Japanese house] and its inhabitant, or more generally the user of space, is much more relevant to me. Thus the work of Kyoichi TSUZUKI presents much more then just a style. I see these rooms as a spatial enlargement of the inhabitantﾕs personality and taste. The objects we see in there often appear in strange collections, making excessive use of the space. That is because once people start to collect something, the collections themselves will soon develop an own dynamic. TSUZUKI defines them as Fetisch. More generally spoken we can describe them as Kitsch. There have been only two definitions of Kitsch in the art-context: 1. one is done by Clement Greenberg, an art-critic, who wrote in 1939: The alternative to Abstraction is Kitsch. 2. the other definition is done by post-modern artists and -critics to describe an art that is making use of the methods of public Kitsch by focusing on the ugly, the comic, the obscene etc as we can see in the works of Jeff Koons and Gilbert and George. But what is finally missing is a definition, which proposes the objects we see in Roadside Japan and in the erotic designs of the Love Hotels to be art as well, although those objects, interiors are mostly done by common people without any artistic intention or education. The German term Volkskunst might give an explanation to this "art". But still this term reflects a very segregational view towards art. It is to divide art from "art", the first one would be genuine, the latter one pretentious. So why not think a moment of the idea that everybody is able to produce a piece of art, or even further, that life itself can be a piece of art. That is exactly what TSUZUKI claims in his work. His Definition of what is art and what is design is wide open, as he shows the reader in the Street Design Files, a first-ever collection of passionate outsider punch to show up the dead-ended design community. He attacks the professionals in the art- and design-business for their work today. The design profession is a bore...Design was supposed to be something more exciting!
sebastian kettner		back
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