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Makota Sasaki, "12 Hours" Heartbeat Drawing, 2004

The tradition of repeated gesture and the extended single-line drawing has been literally given new dimensions by this Japanese artist born in 1964. Sasaki, who lives in Tokyo, started his "Heartbeat Drawing" project in 1995, a series wherein he executes a sharp spike in red ink for each pulse of his blood. The physical discipline and intense concentration required by this practice, and executed over durations as long as a million heartbeats, required an equally demanding amount of attention from the printmaker. Arber, who calls this "the most challenging print I've ever made," worked for a year from a drawing done by Sasaki on film in order to produce this edition of one-color lithographs, each of which runs continuously for 240 centimeters--the length of eight pages.

Sasaki's transcription of his heartbeats, some of which can cover an entire wall, has invited comparison with paintings by Cy Twombly and Agnes Martin. Both artists extended hand drawn lines into what can be read as meditative gestures. Sasaki's drawing, like theirs, displays both consistency and variation along the lines. While this may be taken to represent both the nature of the heartbeats themselves, as well as the fallibility of the human hand, it also has the effect of producing an almost tactile surface. From a distance the print can appear almost as if it were a woven textile.

This edition features a special wrap around the print that is marked with the artist's hanko and fastened with a handmade bamboo closure.

by Bill Fox