Trained as a painter at ateliers in Tokyo and Paris, Konopik has spent almost half a century refining her personal lexicon of minimalist curves and lines. Her abstractions respond swiftly to opportunities for mark-making, finding humor in unexpected shape-shifts and rich moments of color. She draws inspiration from the concentrated finesse of hard-edge visionaries such as Ellsworth Kelly, the strong palette of the abstract expressionist Sam Francis, and the poise of Scandinavian design, but asserts her independence from them all when she talks about her quest for a personal expression of compositional harmony —“a little world of poem and melody on canvas.”

Abstraction, for her, is the most direct route to that harmony, the one that allows the artist to have the maximum amount of freedom and control. She hopes viewers will take the opportunity to create a direct emotional connection to the fundamental elements of painting as she sees it: color, shape, and line. 

 

“I love colors because of its colors.

I love lines because of its line.

I love shapes because of its shapes.”

—Yoko Kondo Konopik

 

Yoko Kondo Konopik: On Canvas will be on view in the Marjorie Barrick Museum of Art’s East Gallery from January 17 - May 17, 2025, with an opening reception from 5–8 p.m. on the evening of January 24. The Marjorie Barrick Museum is open from Tuesday–Saturday, 10 a.m.–5 p.m. Entry is always free. 

 

About Yoko Kondo Konopik

Yoko Kondo Konopik is a Japanese-American painter whose abstract compositions bring shape, line, and color together in precise harmony. She studied painting at the ateliers of artists S. Etchuya, T. Daikubara (Tokyo, Japan), and Richard Wilhelm (Paris, France). She has been a member of the Koenji and Ginsai Art Groups (Tokyo, Japan), The Art League (Alexandria, Virginia, U.S.A.), and the Henderson Art Association (Henderson, Nevada). Her work has been exhibited in Egypt, Indonesia, Japan, and the United States.

 

Image credit: Yoko Kondo Konopik, Red and Blue Duet, 2003, Oil and charcoal on canvas