Beginning Again
A decade ago, at the age of 19, Masanori Handa journeyed from Japan to India and underwent experiences so powerful and overwhelming that he became an artist. “I had the sensation of being in my own skin among many people”, he remembers, trying to explain how the immensity of India awakened his desire to turn his most personal thoughts and feelings into art. “But later I felt this [sensation] was disappearing, and the mentoring year with Rebecca reminded me of where I began. That’s what is important.”
In May, on a visit to Rebecca Horn’s studio at Bad König in spectacular German countryside, Handa tells me how his inspiration is derived “from places and phenomena that are happening” to him. “I don’t have any way of categorizing or analysing or dissecting,” he says. “Rather, I’m just trying to absorb what’s happening in my senses.” He leans forward, impelled by a fundamental urgency that seems to run through his entire body. “I use my hands,” he adds with great animation, describing how, “as I talk through my ideas, I use materials and keep changing them. I need to vocalise…So I need somebody who can listen to me, and with whom I can discuss.”
That is why the opportunity to meet and share his ideas with Rebecca Horn proved so exciting. As we walk through her studio, a luminous, white-painted interior converted from a textile factory once owned by Horn’s grandfather, the extraordinary range and inventiveness of her barrier-breaking work become clear. In one immense room, several large paintings filled with free and scattered marks convey her restless energy. She calls them “cosmic maps”, explaining with great relish that “they’re all to do with the pulsation of my own body and how far I can stretch my arms to use these fantastic brushes!”
Horn’s physical dynamism has a lot in common with Handa’s energy, even though they are in other respects very contrasted as artists and individuals. German and Japanese culture remain enormously different, yet Horn did not hesitate to select Handa as her protégé. As a teacher for 20 years, mainly at Universität der Künste in Berlin, but also in California, she excelled at communicating with young artists. And now, having retired from teaching in February 2009, she takes delight in feeling that “I have become a young artist again, or maybe even younger!”