Yutaka Matsuda

Born: Tokushima,1942. Died: 1998
Period of Membership in GUTAI: 1967-1972

Matsuda participated in the 17th Gutai Art Exhibition in 1966 after graduating from the art department of Naniwa Junior College (now Osaka University of Arts Junior College). He became a member of Gutai the following year. His mechanical works were positioned in the context of environmental art, and he exhibited at the ”From Space to Environment” exhibition along with Joji Kikunami and Norio Imai. The two-dimensional pieces Matsuda worked on are characterized by repetitive movements driven by motors. As the titles of the works suggest, these movements are humorous. His reason for selecting square as the shape and white as the color was to dilute the presence of the work as an object and to instead focus consciousness on the movement of the machine itself. It can be said that his work is symbolic of the kinetic trend in Gutai from 1965 onwards.