Yujiro OTSUKI (1948-), original signed print, 1983

Roland topor in april 1986 speaks of this friend: the electric engraver yujiro otsuki works like a lightning rod. It points its multiple antennas towards the sky in search of wandering volts, cosmic rays, storms. In the manner of the gold searches of yesteryear, sifting through the sand of rivers to find their nuggets, he dredges the ether in order to draw his energy, his inspiration. When he sensed an electrical flow. He transcribes it at lightning speed on any medium, whether it is conductive like copper plate, or non-conductive like wood or rubber. Fantastic quantities of energy rush into it, crackling and smoking. Light becomes ink, lightning transforms into a sign. We should not believe that our atmosphere is empty because the gods have deserted it. It is filled with sparks, words and images in transit, screams, sound and fury, memories, microbes and toxic gases. Some say the air is polluted, they say we breathe miasma from our garbage. But the most desolate public dump constitutes, for those who know how to see and who have the patience to search, a mine of treasures. Yujiro is a scavenger of scraps, a collector of crumbs, an inventor of wreckage. His engravings take stock of the riches of the sky. There we see swirls of letters stirred by impalpable currents, and cigarettes carried by stellar winds. We see something else there too. Look carefully. What do you see between the lines. The dust of time.

Ref. : C5XXVVKU