What the Heck is Gutai?

How painting with your feet can make you part of the Gutai art movement.

The ideology of the postwar Japanese art group known as the Gutai Art Association (Gutai Bijutsu Kyokai), was that members followed their own individual paths, generating the impulsive energy of children as they did so. This is probably why you look at Gutai paintings and say “My kid could do that!” Many of the original members of the Gutai art movement were elementary and kindergarten art teachers.

Gutai, meaning “embodiment”, “bodily instrument”, or “concreteness” led the post-war contemporary art scene in Japan but was neglected for four decades until the Guggenheim mounted a comprehensive exhibition of its work in 2012.

Kazuo Shiraga was one of the earliest members of the Gutai Art Association and one of its leading members. He posthumously attained a world auction record for Chiretsusei Katsusemba (1961) when the work was auctioned off at Christie’s in 2013. Shiraga tried many different approaches: painting with his feet, with his entire body, while hanging from the ceiling; a true performative painting process.