Wakana Kimura: Journey to the West: Alien of Extraordinary Ability

The classic Chinese novel Journey to the West, attributed to Wu Cheng’en, is a tale of pilgrimage, hardship, and loss. It tells the story of the Buddhist monk Tang Sanzang, who travels West to gather sacred texts, encountering many challenges and enduring great suffering throughout their passage. Tang Sanzang is not alone on this pilgrimage; he has guardians to protect as well as demons to obstruct. This legendary tale parallels the 7th-century Buddhist monk Xuanzang, whose travels to the Western regions (India) took 17 years, resulting in a collection of original Sanskrit texts conveyed to China on the backs of scores of mules.

The title of Wakana Kimura’s exhibition Journey to the West: Alien of Extraordinary Ability offers homage to this extraordinary tale. Kimura presents a personal story, in pictorial majesty, of her journey West, but for her story, West is Los Angeles, California. In Kimura’s chronicling, her 17 year odyssey is of a young Japanese woman who leaves her culture and home, moves to Los Angeles, goes to school, works, lives, and learns the language and culture of a country and region unfamiliar to her. She receives a visa, then a green card, identifying her as an “Alien of Extraordinary Ability.” Metaphorically retracing the rewards and hardships of the Journey to the West, she blazes her future. Her demons and guardians are front and center in this exquisite body of paintings, not as a threat or regret but as a powerful reimagining, communicating her observations and Japanese heritage through vivid iconic symbols of her culture.

Kimura’s unique studio practice is an allegorical mash-up of East and West, with references to Japanese manga, anime, and Western graffiti cloaked in Buddhist figuration. She interprets Buddhist mythological characters from many cultures, mixing them in her loose, brushy drawings and paintings of mixed metaphors. Her contemporized figures are cloaked in hot colors, genderless, and exaggerated with distorted time lines and mismatched cultures. Her work also speaks of the migration of culture, as people sought safety from India to China, to Korea, and Japan; how cultural accommodation was shaped by the impact of multiple wars, dominated by warring patriarchies. Understanding the recondite paintings of Kimura is a journey through symbolic language.

On view in the exhibition will be Wakana Kimura’s Twelve General portraits mounted on scrolls by Master Hyogushi, Shosaku Yoshimura. Mr. Yoshimura is a third-generation hyogushi (master scroll and screen mounter), one of only a handful of hyogushi who are allowed to repair and restore Japanese national treasures. The collaboration between Mr. Yoshimura and Kimura is unique; he designed the scrolls for Kimura’s paintings because he valued her vision and liked the challenge of melding a centuries-old tradition with a contemporary artist’s vision.

The paintings are on Udagami paper, traditionally produced in Yoshino, Nara Prefecture, a type of pure mulberry paper containing white clay derived from crushed limestone found in the region. The white clay prevents transparency, repells insects, acts as an antioxidant (protection against burning), and maintains elasticity. Uda paper is recognized as the finest of Japanese papers, often used for the restoration of cultural properties. The scrolls are finished with layers of heavy silk brocade, with enameled wood, or gold plated rods at the top and bottom of the scroll.

Along with the stunning scrolls will be a large mural, LA Mandala, exhibited during the 2023 City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs Independent Master Artist Project (COLA) exhibition. We expect the 314-inch-wide painting, comprising four panels, to span the length of the gallery’s first exhibition room.

We’re also pleased to announce that Wakana Kimura’s select scroll paintings will be on view in our booth at Untitled Art Fair in December 2024.