FAMOUS ARTIST BIRTHDAY - KAZUO NAKAMURA

KAZUO NAKAMURA

Kazuo Nakamura was a Japanese-Canadian painter and sculptor and a founding member of the Toronto-based PAINTERS ELEVEN group in the 1950s. Wikipedia

Born: October 13, 1926, Vancouver

Died: April 9, 2002, Toronto

I can't remember how I cam across Kazuo, but I do love the way his work speaks of the structure of the universe; it appeals to my love of science. Nakamura was concerned with science, time and space. He described himself as seeking a "fundamental universal pattern in all art and nature" reflected in his "inner structure" paintings from the 1950s. 

In the 1970s and 80s he increasingly emphasized his grid paintings based on number structures, which came to involve the Pascal triangle. To Nakamura, these laboriously inscribed works were a quest for some ultimate order in the apparent chaos of the universe.

Ah! Yes, I think we all seek a sense of order. Being largely a painter of nature, it didn't take me long to realize that every form has a pattern and structure. I also learned that painting structure as you see or photograph it, is not the way to become an excellent floral or landscape painter. Although many buyers say they want to be able to recognize a scene or to name a flower, it is color and surprise factor that they really respond to and inspires them to collect your work. This is the line a professional artist must tiptoe across like a high wire act. I think it is that line that fascinated Leonardo da Vinci and why he created so few paintings.

Kazuo Nakamura took his love of natural structure and created abstract art which continues to beguile and fascinate. If you love natural abstracts, he is certainly an artist to study.

Some of my abstract paintings that are closest to his work are below and can be purchased at Daily Paintworks.