The 1960s drew Teruko Yokoi to Paris, a city alive with the avant-garde spirit and artistic innovation. Though her time there was divided between Paris and Tokyo, the period proved profoundly influential, yielding some of her most vibrant and enduring works. It was during this time that Yokoi refined her iconic diamond form, a motif that became a hallmark of her practice.
Teruko Yokoi (1924-2020)
Teruko Yokoi's art exists in the delicate space where East meets West, tradition converses with modernity, and bold abstraction embraces poetic nuance. A celebrated Japanese-Swiss painter, her extraordinary career spanned continents, movements, and decades, earning her a place among the vanguard of post-war abstraction.
Born in Tsushima, Japan, Yokoi's artistic journey began with a disciplined foundation in traditional Japanese art. Her early studies under Kouki Suzuki and later under Impressionist painter Takanori Kinoshita imbued her work with an innate sensitivity to color, form, and light. Yet, even as a young artist, Yokoi's vision extended beyond convention, pushing her toward the artistic epicenters of the West.
In the 1950s, Yokoi emigrated to the United States, studying at the California School of Fine Arts (now San Francisco Art Institute). Here, amidst the vibrant energy of the Bay Area, she began to forge her own artistic language, synthesizing the fluidity of Japanese aesthetics with the daring experimentation of American Abstract Expressionism. Her time under the mentorship of Hans Hofmann and Julian Levi at the Art Students League of New York further sharpened her vision, while exhibitions at prestigious venues like the California Palace of the Legion of Honor, Philadelphia Annual Exhibition, the Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA) London, and the Corcoran Gallery of Art propelled her into the international spotlight.Both Hans and Julian saw immense potential in Yokoi, often encouraging her to paint alone as much as in class, fostering the independence and originality that became hallmarks of her work.
Her trajectory was marked by resilience. Born to paint, painting became her constant through nearly eight decades of challenges and triumphs. A childhood shaped by the hardships of World War II imbued her art with a profound understanding of darkness, but it was her ability to transcend fragility-both perceived and real-that defined her life and legacy. Surviving war, immigration, divorce, and cultural displacement, Yokoi's indomitable spirit carved her a unique space within the world of fine art.
Not merely a student of her era's greats, Yokoi stood amongst them, building relationships and exchanging ideas with some of the most significant figures in modern abstraction. Mark Rothko, Joan Mitchell, and Kenzo Okada were not only her peers but part of her creative dialogue. Yet, her work always remained distinctly her own-a harmonious interplay of gestural freedom, vibrant color, and lyrical balance inspired by her profound connection to nature.
The 1960s drew Teruko Yokoi to Paris, a city alive with the avant-garde spirit and artistic innovation. Though her time there was divided between Paris and Tokyo, the period proved profoundly influential, yielding some of her most vibrant and enduring works. It was during this time that Yokoi refined her iconic diamond form, a motif that became a hallmark of her practice. These works radiated with bold, saturated hues-vivid reds, electric blues, striking yellows, and magentas-contrasted by the occasional somberness of deep blacks, reflecting the emotional intensity of the era.
Paris in the 1960s was a city of boundless energy, but it was also steeped in the tension of the Cold War, a reality especially palpable for non-citizens like Yokoi. It was against this backdrop that she witnessed Nikita Khrushchev's motorcade pass through the streets of Paris in 1960, an experience that directly inspired her painting Red and Gray. In an interview with Mark Whitney, Yokoi described the work as a meditation on the heart's resilience and survival amidst a gray, desolate world. The delicate touches of green she included in the composition symbolized the small flowers that persistently bloom along life's uncertain paths, untouched by human conflict. "They do not care about our wars," she reflected. "They exist in their own right and only seek the sunshine."
This pivotal work would later catch the attention of Arnold Rudlinger, then Curator and Director at the Kunsthalle Basel. Red and Gray became a centerpiece in her seminal 1964 exhibition at the Kunsthalle, where she shared the stage with Otto Tschumi and Walter Bodmer. The recognition Yokoi garnered during this time solidified her place among the leading abstractionists of her generation, and her Parisian chapter remains a defining moment in her extraordinary career.
New York, Tokyo and Paris were also the backdrop of her relationship with fellow painter Sam Francis. Teruko Yokoi’s marriage to Sam Francis, though brief, became a turning point in her life and career. Their relationship began in the vibrant artistic circles of New York, where they first crossed paths at a party hosted by Martha Jackson following the opening of a Picasso exhibition at the Met in 1957. Despite a series of near misses—Sam searching for Teruko at the Art Students League while she worked in her Greenwich Village studio, and later, his travels to Japan for the Tokyo Mural project and Paris delaying their reunion—they ultimately found each other again before Sam’s major exhibition at Martha Jackson Gallery in late 1957.
Teruko and Sam married the following year, building a life together while living in a penthouse apartment at New York’s storied Hotel Chelsea and welcoming a daughter. Yet, even as Teruko navigated marriage and motherhood, she remained steadfast in her own artistic path and being incedibly productive as she painted for exhibitions on multiple continents. She painted some of her most sought after oils and works on paper and forged close friendships with fellow artists and art critics like Nancy Frankel, Shirley Jaffe, Joan Mitchell, and Rachel Jacobs.
Teruko and Sam's union was not destined to last. The marriage began to unravel when Sam arrived at Teruko’s landmark solo exhibition at Minami Gallery in Tokyo in 1961 with Kiki Kogelnik by his side. This betrayal signaled the end of their relationship, leading to their eventual separation in Bern in 1962. While Sam would go on to remarry, Teruko never did. Instead, she channeled the emotional weight of their parting into her art, reaffirming her dedication to her craft over romantic entanglements.
This period of solitude became a defining chapter in her life, driving her to establish herself in Bern, where she withdrew from the social circles of New York and Paris to focus entirely on painting, printmaking, and raising her daughter. The dissolution of her marriage was not an end, but a catalyst—one that reinforced her independence and artistic vision, ensuring her legacy as a painter who remained resolutely true to herself.
In Bern, Switzerland, where she ultimately found her artistic sanctuary. Here, her work matured into a singular expression of vibrant abstraction and meditative beauty. A prolific printmaker, Yokoi expanded her creative repertoire through nearly 100 known editions of lithographs and offset lithographs between the late 1960s and early 2000s, a testament to her ceaseless innovation.
Her exhibitions at esteemed institutions such as Kunsthalle Basel, Kunsthalle Winterthur, Kunst Museum Bern, and Gallery Kornfeld solidified her place in the European art scene, while her legacy is enshrined in two museums in Japan: the Teruko Yokoi Hinageshi Art Museum in Ena and the Yokoi Teruko Fuji Museum of Art in Shizuoka. Her major retrospective at Marlborough Gallery, New York, thrust her back into the spotlight in the United States and now Emerald Room and Emerald Editions represent the Artist's Estate, led by her Daughter Kayo, to share Teruko's legacy. These spaces, dedicated to her work, celebrate the timeless resonance of her vision and the enduring relevance of her artistry.
Yokoi's studio practice endured into her eighties, a remarkable testament to her unwavering dedication. She never remarried and never pursued any role outside of her identity as an artist, embodying a life wholly devoted to creation. Her work remains a quiet yet commanding reminder of resilience, much like the finest emeralds-untouched, raw, and profound.
Through her fearless exploration of form and color, Teruko Yokoi invites viewers into a contemplative dialogue, offering a timeless expression of beauty and strength. Her legacy endures, continuing to inspire new generations of collectors and admirers.