Chelsea, New York
Shigeko Kubota
Video Mirror
Fergus McCaffreyHonoring the 50th anniversary of Shigeko Kubota’s (1937-2015) first video sculpture, Duchampiana: Marcel Duchamp’s Grave, 1972–1975, Fergus McCaffrey is proud to present an exhibition surveying the artist’s foundational work pioneering video as an immersive medium. First exhibited at The Kitchen, New York, in 1975, Duchampiana: Marcel Duchamp’s Grave, refracts images of the artist’s grave in Rouen, France into an infinite mirror. Alongside this early work is Kubota’s final experiment in video sculpture, Video Rock Garden, 1996. Restored and exhibited for the first time since the artist’s 1996 solo exhibition, Video is Ghost of Yourself, at Lance Fung Gallery, Video Rock Garden reinterprets traditional Japanese rock gardens through mirrored polygons and ethereal, colorful floral imagery. Also included in the exhibition are Niagara Falls I, 1985, representing the development of Kubota's multimedia immersive environments, Video Poem, 1970-1975, which premiered at the Kitchen alongside Duchamp's Grave, and Meta-Marcel: Window, 1976, the origin of the flower imagery that appears in Video Rock Garden. Together, these works chart evolutions in Kubota’s approach, from the combination of traditional forms and new media to enduring concerns of landscape, self, death and technology. Shigeko Kubota exhibited her work widely, including solo exhibitions at The Kitchen, New York (1975), Rene Block Gallery, New York (1976, 1977), Long Beach Museum of Art (1977), Japan Society, New York (1978, 1983), the American Museum of the Moving Image, New York (1991), Whitney Museum (1996), and international group exhibitions including Documenta, Kassel (1977, 1987), Whitney Biennial (1983), and Venice Biennale (1993). Recent solo retrospectives include “Viva Video” toured to the Niigata Prefectural Museum of Modern Art, National Museum of Art, Osaka; and Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo (2021–2022) and “Liquid Reality” at The Museum of Modern Art, New York (2021).