Boxing with Greatness

* Ushio Shinohara Takes Houston

By Catherine D. Anspon // May 1, 2015

1/0

Ushio and Noriko Shinohara star in the 2013 Oscar-nominated documentary — to be screened at the Deborah Colton Gallery exhibition — "Cutie and the Boxer."

Shinohara's practive encompasses a huge dose of performance art. At Deborah Colton Gallery, he boxes with a canvas, Friday, May 1, 6:30 pm.

Shinohara with his wife, fellow artist Noriko Shinohara, at the Walker Art Center's blockbuster, "International Pop." In the background (right), Ushio's riff on Rauschenberg's 1958 combine, "Coca-Cola Plan." (The original Rauschenberg is on the left.)

Shinohara, now in his early 80s, has lived and worked in New York since 1969.

Art denizens can meet and catch a solo for a rare, previously under-known talent whose star is now ascendant.

Cue Ushio Shinohara‘s dual openings this Friday, May 1 (performance 6:30 pm), and again Saturday, May 2 (reception 6 to 9 pm). This re-emerging Tokyo-born post-war Neo Dadaist with punk rock overtones melds performance, painting and sculpture into a concoction that is fresh and insouciant.

Not to be overshadowed by her husband, Noriko Shinohara‘s delicate drawings laced with text lay bare a portrait of marriage in unflinching detail, often in contrast to the droll nature of her almost cartoon-fashioned characters.

The couple are paired in the perfectly titled “Love is a Roar-r-r!” Also presented at DCG is the Oscar-nominated doc Cutie and the Boxer, a captivating take on the Shinoharas’ often combustible marriage as well as their authentic careers.

The timing for the Houston show (which follows the artists’ debut this March at Kirk Hopper Fine Art, Dallas) is synchronistic: Concurrently the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, mounts an exhibition that is rewriting art history — “International Pop,” with Ushio Shinohara as one of the headliners (through August 29). Deborah Colton Gallery exhibition through June 27.