New installation at Rice Gallery opens April 13

Japanese artist Onishi creates ‘reverse of volume’

Japanese artist Yasuaki Onishi is using the simplest materials — translucent plastic sheeting, strings of black glue and fishing line — to transform the space of Rice Gallery to a “reverse of volume” installation.

An installation by Japanese artist Yasuaki Onishi will be on view at Rice Art Gallery from April 13 to June 24.

The installation will be on view from April 13 to June 24. An opening celebration April 13 from 5 to 7 p.m. will feature a gallery talk by the artist at 6 p.m. A second reception will be April 14 from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.; the artist will speak at noon. All events are free and open to the public.

Curated by Joshua Fischer, assistant curator at Rice Gallery, the installation coincides with the grand opening of the Asia Society Texas Center’s new Houston headquarters designed by Yoshio Taniguchi.

Onishi’s creations are monumental forms that resemble mountains or clouds floating in space. His process of “casting the invisible” involves draping the sheeting over objects, which are removed to leave only their impressions. Onishi views this process of “reversing” sculpture to be a meditation on the nature of the negative space, or void, left behind.

Onishi studied sculpture at the University of Tsukuba and Kyoto City University of Arts. He has had solo exhibitions throughout Japan and internationally, and his work was included in”Ways of Worldmaking” (2011) at the National Museum of Art in Osaka. His most recent solo exhibition in the United States was in 2012 at the Marlin and Regina Miller Gallery at Kutztown University in Kutztown, Pa. In 2010, Onishi was the recipient of a United States-Japan Foundation Fellowship, which included a residency at the Vermont Studio Center, as well as a grant from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation Inc.

For more information on the installation, visit http://ricegallery.org/ or call 713-348-6069.