Fakirs 1951

Yasuo Kuniyoshi made this painting, Fakirs, using oil on canvas. It's not necessarily the material itself, but the way Kuniyoshi handles the paint that strikes me. See how he’s thinned the pigment, blurring the boundaries between forms. This lends a dreamlike quality, appropriate for a scene that evokes a circus, or perhaps a theatre stage. The figures – a clown, a mask, a tent – are all stock characters, ready to perform. Kuniyoshi doesn't use paint in a traditional way to create realistic depth, but rather to flatten the image and emphasize the artifice of the scene. It’s almost like a stage set, propped up for our viewing pleasure. By focusing on the artificiality of representation, Kuniyoshi invites us to question what we see, and how it relates to the real world outside the frame. This painting is a reminder that art is not simply a mirror reflecting reality, but rather a lens through which we can examine and question it.