Serizawa Keisuke (1895-1984), one of Japan's most celebrated textile artists, is known in America to a handful of connoisseurs and specialists. His life's work can now be widely appreciated through an exhibition opening on Friday at Japan Society.

Serizawa, who was trained a graphic designer and commercial artist, created advertising posters and publications as well as traditional lacquer and wood designs at the start of his career. In his early 30s, he became associated with a group of craft artists who practiced mingei, or art based on folk traditions. Serizawa, however, was a polymath who worked in other media and drew inspiration from many cultures, both Asian and Western. This gave him a certain independence from any one group of artists and collectors and enabled him to follow his personal vision unimpeded by group affiliations.

Left to right: Gallery Director Joe Earle discussing Serizawa's method for producing the Straw Rope Curtain; Mandala of the Four Seasons, 1971; two of Serizawa's kimono designs dating from the 1960s. Photos: Peggy Roalf.

A collector of traditional craft objects who also immersed himself in the study and enjoyment of nature, Serizawa learned about the stencil-dyed textile arts of Okinawa in 1928. About ten years later, he traveled to Okinawa to study the precise bingata technique, which involved creating a repeat pattern using a single stencil. His mastery of this technique, which he applied to both fabric and paper, made his work, if not his name, known throughout Japan. In 1956, he was awarded the Holder of an Importantly Intangible Cultural Property, commonly known as Living National Treasure of Japan.

The exhibition, which was curated by Gallery Director Joe Earle, brings together 100 pieces from the beginning of Serizawa's career onward, starting with magazine covers and slipcases he created around 1932 for Kogei, an important craft magazine. While he did not study stencil dying in Okinawa until 1939, he began creating stencil-dyed art nearly ten years earlier. One of these, a length of silk printed with bamboo grass and peonies, traditional subjects in Japanese art, is abstracted in a way reminiscent of Henri Matisse's late cutouts.

Among the masterpieces on display is a group of stencil-dyed kimonos, which were created as art objects not to be worn. His artistry in designing a single motif to be repeated dozens of times, straight-on and flopped, in a way appropriate to the final shaping of the kimono, is mind-bending.

Likewise his designs for folded screens, and for noren, or entrance curtains. One of these, Nawa Noren, or Straw Rope Curtain, is an amusing self-referential design in which a curtain made of rope is printed on a black curtain. This piece exemplifies Serizawa's unique fusion of modernist design with traditional craft aesthetics.

The same can be said of his book designs and covers, which range from a folk tale about a Chinese woman ninja to compilations of his stencil designs printed by hand in editions limited to 50 copies or so. Yet another side of his practice is seen in a collection of designs stencil dyed onto handmade papers. A group of these, hung together in a small gallery, are bold yet lyrical abstractions of Chinese characters for truth and faith, along with four pieces based on Chinese characters for the four seasons.

The exhibition, in which the boundary of each group of objects is delineated by intense earth colors, was designed by Queens-based artist Perry Hu. A beautifully designed and illustrated catalogue (Japan Society/Yale University Press 2009) is available in the gift shop.

Serizawa: Master of Japanese Textile Design, opens on Friday October 9 and continues through January 17, 2010 at Japan Society. 333 East 47^th Street, New York, New York, NY. 212.715.1262. Please visit the website for information about the exhibition and related public programs.