“Tsuruko Yamazaki endorsed a distinctly non-humanist view of agency by emphasizing the interface between material properties themselves”
・ Joan Kee, Professor, History of Art, University of Michigan, introduction to “Artist’s Portfolio: Tsuruko Yamazaki,” Artforum, February 2013
A founding member of the Japanese Gutai Art Association, Tsuruko Yamazaki (山崎 つる子) was the only woman artist who remained with the group from its beginning in 1954 to its disbanding in 1972.
Tsuruko Yamazaki joined Gutai’s major exhibitions, including the Outdoor Gutai Art Exhibition at Ashiya Park in 1956; the sixth Gutai Art Exhibition held in September 1958 at the Martha Jackson Gallery at 32 East 69th Street, New York (in the same townhouse now occupied by Hauser & Wirth) ; and the international group show “Nul 1965” at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam (see discussion in “Zero: Let Us Explore the Stars,” 4 July – 7 November 2015, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam).
“Tsuruko Yamazaki: Beyond GutaÏ,” the first solo exhibition of Tsuruko Yamazaki’s work outside of Japan, was held in 2010 by Almine Rech, Paris, organized in collaboration with Midori Nishisawa and Olivier Renaud-Clément (13 March – 30 April).
Tsuruko Yamazaki’s work has been exhibited in major surveys of Japanese modern and contemporary arts. Examples include “Japon des Avant-Gardes 1910–1970” at the Centre Pompidou, Paris (1986); “Japanese Art after 1945: Scream Against the Sky,” curated by Alexandra Munroe, at the Yokohama Museum of Art, Japan, the Guggenheim SoHo,New York, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (1994–95); and “Gutai: Splendid Playground” at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (2013).
She participated in the Forty-Fifth (1993) and Fifty-Third (2009) Venice Biennales.
Tsuruko Yamazaki is represented by the Tokyo gallery Take Ninagawa. Take Ninagawa exhibited “Work” (1967) at Art Basel in Hong Kong in 2017.
See:
TsurukoYamazaki at Take Ninagawa
TsurukoYamazaki (1925-2019), Artforum, 13 June 2019
Tsuruko Yamazaki, Art Basel
Joan Kee, introduction to “Artist’s Portfolio: Tsuruko Yamazaki,” Artforum, February 2013
Joan Kee, Professor, History of Art, University of Michigan; to be Clark Professor at Williams College, GradArt, spring 2021
“Hilton Als, Joan Kee, Anne Lafont, Kobena Mercer to Join GradArt as Clark Visiting Professors,” Williams College / Clark Art Institute, 24 February 2020
“Tsuruko Yamazaki: Beyond GutaÏ,” Almine Rech, Paris 13 March – 30 April 2010
“Japanese Art After 1945: Scream Against the Sky,” curated by Alexandra Munroe, Samsung Senior Curator, Asian Art, and Senior Advisor, Global Arts, at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York
“Zero: Let Us Explore the Stars,” 4 July – 7 November 2015, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam
“A Visual Essay on Gutai at 32 East 69th Street,” Hauser & Wirth, 12 September – 27 October 2012
Tsuruko Yamazaki, WikiArt