Kumi Sugai, Guest III, Silkscreen on Paper, 1980

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Guest III by Kumi Sugaï (菅井汲) Silkscreen on paper edition 10/150 - Gendai Hanga Center, Tokyo, 1980

A bold meditation on duality and geometric tension, Guest III is a signed, limited-edition silkscreen by Kumi Sugaï (1919–1996), one of the most internationally celebrated Japanese artists of the postwar era.

This exemplary print comes with exceptional provenance: it bears the blind embossed stamp of the Gendai Hanga Center (現代版画センター) in the lower right margin — the publisher’s authentication seal pressed directly into the paper — alongside the gallery label of Satani Gallery (佐谷画廊), Tokyo, the primary Japanese representative of Sugaï’s work.

The work is further documented in the artist’s catalogue raisonné as No. 300 (Katsuo Hara, Sugaï: Catalogue raisonné de l’œuvre gravé 1955–1996, Art Dune, 1996). Together, these three layers of documentation place this print among the most rigorously authenticated examples of Sugaï’s graphic work available on the market.

The Gendai Hanga Center, active in Tokyo from 1974 to 1985, was one of Japan’s most distinguished print publishers, collaborating with over eighty artists across disciplines and later commissioning Andy Warhol’s celebrated Kiku series in 1983. To bear its embossed seal is a mark of institutional distinction.

The composition presents two circles in a masterful counterpoint of positive and negative space: a white void suspended within a deep navy field above, mirrored by a solid cobalt disc set against a pale ground below. Flanking vertical and horizontal striped registers animate the work with rhythmic precision, while a fine diagonal hatching across the background — printed with remarkable delicacy — adds quiet, almost tactile depth. The palette, restrained yet commanding, reflects the graphic authority Sugaï developed during his Paris years, where he absorbed Minimalism and Hard Edge painting while retaining a distinctly Japanese economy of means.

Sugaï’s work is held in the permanent collections of the Guggenheim Museum and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. He participated in the Venice Biennale, documenta (1959, 1964), and the São Paulo Biennial, and held a major retrospective at the Seibu Museum of Art, Tokyo, in 1983.

Artist: Kumi Sugaï (菅井汲), Japanese, 1919–1996
Title: Guest III Year: 1980
Medium: Silkscreen on paper
Edition: 10 of 150
Publisher: Gendai Hanga Center (現代版画センター), Tokyo Authentication: Blind embossed publisher’s stamp, lower right margin
Sold through: Satani Gallery (佐谷画廊), Tokyo
Catalogue raisonné: No. 300 (Hara, 1996)
Signed: Lower right, pencil (Sugai)
Sheet size: 62 × 46.5 cm (24.4 × 18.3 in)
Framed size: 77 × 61.5 cm (30.3 × 24.2 in)
Frame: Aluminium frame with passepartout
Condition: Very good

Colors may slightly vary due to photographic lighting sources or your monitor settings.

Wear consistent with age and use.

Kumí Sugai, Guest III, Japanese Modernism, Geometric Abstraction, Op Art, Post-War Art, Limited Edition Print, Signed Print, Screenprint, Serigraph, 1970s Modern Art, Paris School, Graphic Abstraction, Collectible Print, Original Frame, Mid-Century Modern Art.