'Origin of Desire': Artist Mari Ito reimagines desire as radical, living force in debut solo

Japanese artist Mari Ito in her debut solo show in India has brought together a body of sculptural works, along with large and small-format paintings, that merge elements of Japanese surrealism with folkloric animism in breaking away from ordered narratives of obedience and redefining desire as a primal force.

Japanese artist Mari Ito in her debut solo show in India has brought together a body of sculptural works, along with large and small-format paintings, that merge elements of Japanese surrealism with folkloric animism in breaking away from ordered narratives of obedience and redefining desire as a primal force. ''Origin of Desire'', presented by Gallerie Geek/Art at The Ballroom, Bikaner House, unfolds Ito's world of biological extravagance -- surreal flowers with human-like faces, swelling organic forms, and luminous colour fields. Rooted in traditional Nihonga techniques, her practice involves layering pigments, sumi ink, and nikawa on Oguni washi, preserving the rigour of Japanese craftsmanship while expanding its visual language through the brightness and dimensionality of the Mediterranean. Ito's works, both sculptures and paintings, are filled with swelling seeds and pods that bloom into whimsical compositions, while cellular rhythms pulse through sturdy stems and flourishing petals, as she ''stages desire and its many instruments as a primal force''. ''To visualise this multifaceted nature of desire, I paint many different facial expressions, symbolising the complex emotions that swirl within us. Just as our cells respond subtly when we feel emotions, plants also move and grow through the activity of their cells. The many dots, grains, and patterns in my work represent the invisible world, cells, bacteria, the movement of air, an attempt to make these unseen life forces visible,'' the Barcelona-based artist said in a statement. According to the gallery, in Ito's world of ''biopolitical fabulism'' what meanders beneath is ''a field of revolution and resistance, desire with political capacity''. Through the forms that resist ''alignment with reproductive futurity prescribed by patriarchal order'', Ito's compositions propose desire as a hybrid, multi-directional vitality ''that mutates, sprouts, and leaks, positioning the body as a site of insurgency''. ''The post-war Japanese nation- and society-building project became tethered to social discipline, gendered responsibility, and normative domesticity, with women positioned as agents of the home and bearers of the future demanded by the state. ''Ito's biomorphic world appears to inherit this history only to pry it open. Her surreal botanica and bodies challenge these ordered narratives of restraint and obedience, bringing forth an interiority shaped by the erotic, the psychic, and the cellular,'' the wall text at the exhibition reads. Her works, while echo the tendencies of Japanese surrealism and folkloric animism, engage with the post-war avant-garde art's ''desire to rupture the boundaries of the body'', as she records the floral and the decorative as sites of mutation and political charge. ''Geek Art as a gallery is committed to setting up encounters with practices, methods, and experiments in art from all across Asia, pushing what the imagination of art from this geography could be. With one of the gallery's bases in New Delhi, we are looking to anchor this with strength. The solo exhibition by Mari Ito, a first by her in India, marks the start of independent programming for us -- bringing new artistic voices, publishing, and public engagements,'' Wribhu Borphukon, curatorial and gallery director, GEEK/ART, said. The exhibition will come to an end on May 1.