If you got an opportunity to listen to the world’s twelve best guitarists playing together you would be experiencing the most awesome bit of music. But if you got these same twelve legends to play the twelve neck guitar of Japanese artist Yoshihiko Satoh it would be impossible for them to perform the task. They would neither be able to play it solo not together. The reason is very simple as this musical instrument is a culmination of twelve guitars joined together.
The twelve neck guitar was first produced by Yoshihiko Satoh way back in 2002 for an exhibition and he named his creation ‘Present Arms’. This creation of his won him the Kirin Art Award Grand Prix then. Over the period of nine years Satoh has gone on adding to his gallery with similar creations having a total of 12 such guitars now. He has given different arrangement styles to his guitars bringing about a whole new art form. There are guitars arranged in a line with their bodies attached and there is one which has been given a circular form.
The functionality of these guitars is not clear but even if they were it would be quite impossible to play them. In spite of this they do draw your attention and cannot stop yourself from complimenting the work of the artist.
According to Satoh this guitar series of his creation is an attempt to “discover the Japanese aesthetic sense disguised in the flow of American culture.” He further says that the twelve necks imply the “amplifying American culture” and “Present Arms is the result of realization.”
Satoh is one of those artists who alters or multiplies mass produced goods giving them a whole new identity. He intends to create sculptures that “unleash the energy residing in the function and shape” of an object.
This is not the first time that Satoh has given shape to such a creation. In the past he has applied the same creativity of stretching to objects like the iron, toy truck and functional mopeds.
In the cases of the iron, toy truck and moped you can see that one single object has been stretched to give it an elongated appearance. In the case of the 12 neck guitar there is an amount of stretching but here it encompasses twelve similar objects put together to make one huge singular object. These multiple guitars are displayed at an exhibition at Roentgenwerke AG in Tokyo. You can drop in any day before August 27, 2011 to catch a glimpse of them.
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