“‘Under Each Other’s Spell’: Gutai and New York,” an exhibit of paintings and other works curated by Dr. Ming Tiampo, will be shown Thursday, October 22 through Wednesday, December 16 at New Jersey City University in the Harold B. Lemmerman Gallery of Hepburn Hall, 2039 Kennedy Boulevard in Jersey City.

New Jersey City University and the Pollock-Krasner House and Study Center are the exhibit’s only two venues. The NJCU exhibit, which immediately follows the Pollock-Kranser House show, will feature three additional paintings as well as one replacement painting. A symposium related to the exhibit, “Gutai: A ‘Concrete’ Discussion of Transnationalism,” will be held at the Guggenheim Museum on Wednesday, November 18 at 6:30 p.m.

Gallery hours for the exhibit are 11:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m., Monday through Friday, and by appointment. A reception will be held 4:30 – 7:00 p.m. on Monday, October 26; Dr. Midori Yoshimoto, NJCU director of campus galleries, will introduce the exhibit at 5:00 p.m. and 6:00 p.m. Dr. Tiampo will deliver a “Curator’s Talk” on Friday, November 20 at 12:00 p.m. in the Harold B. Lemmerman Gallery.

The exhibit features acrylic, oil, and mixed-media paintings and works on paper by Paul Jenkins, Sadamasa Motonaga, Alfonso Ossorio, Shōzō Shimamoto, Kazuo Shiraga, Atsuko Tanaka, Toshio Yoshida, Jirō Yoshihara, Akira Kanayama, Lee Krasner, and Jackson Pollock as well as documents, photographs, and films of Gutai performances and exhibitions.

Many of the exhibit’s works are on loan from the collection of Mr. Jenkins, a New York-based abstract painter, and his wife, Suzanne Jenkins. Mr. Jenkins first met Jirō Yoshihara, leader of the Gutai Art Association, a Japanese avante-garde group of artists, in 1958. In 1964, Mr. Jenkins became an artist-in-residence at the Gutai Pinacotheca, the group’s new space in Osaka. Paintings in the Jenkins’ collection were given to him as gifts and in exchange for his own works. The exhibit’s title derives from the time Mr. Jenkins and Mr. Yoshihara spent together—they were “under each other’s spell.”

Founded in the small town of Ashiya, Japan in 1954, the Gutai Art Association, aware of its distance from the art world, created and sustained a communication network that extended worldwide. The group’s first official activity was the creation and distribution of the Gutai journal, which was sent to artists, critics, journalists, and curators around the world.

In 1956, Mr. Shimamoto sent a letter and journals to Jackson Pollack, requesting his views; copies of the journal were found in the American artist’s library after his death by B. H. Friedman. The show contains the original letter, along with Mr. Friedman’s reply to the Gutai group. Mr. Friedman continued to correspond with Mr. Yoshihara; a selection of these letters is included in the exhibit.

In 1957, Japanese artist Hisao Domoto gave the Gutai journal to French critic Michel Tapié, who, a few months later, traveled to Japan to meet the artists, beginning a decade-long friendship with Mr. Yoshihara. Misters Yoshihara and Tapié planned the 1958 International Art of a New Era, an Osaka exhibit featuring artists from Europe, Japan, and North America. With the help of Mr. Ossorio, the pair brought the Gutai section of the exhibit to New York in 1958. Although the exhibit failed, Mr. Yoshihara had some supporters, including Mr. Jenkins, whom he invited to Japan.

In the years following the New York exhibit, the Gutai Art Association’s reputation improved, due partially to the establishment of the Gutai Pinacotheca in 1962. In addition to Mr. Jenkins, the Gutai Pinachotheca would welcome the world’s most prominent artists, critics, collectors, and curators, including Lawrence Alloway, John Cage, Merce Cunningham, Willem de Kooning, Clement Greenberg, Peggy Guggenheim, Geoff Hendricks, Jasper Johns, William Lieberman, Isamu Noguchi, Yoko Ono, and Robert Rauschenberg.

“‘Under Each Other’s Spell’: Gutai and New York,” has received support from the Stony Brook University Research Foundation, the Pollock-Krasner Foundation, the Thaw Charitable Trust, the Japan Foundation of New York, The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, and Carroll and Donna Janis.

For further information about the exhibit call Dr. Yoshimoto at (201)200-3246.