Keiko Moriuchi, 縷: の先頭 The Forefront of the Never-Ending Thread II, 2025
Acrylic and 24k yellow gold leaf on canvas
22.7 x 15.8 x 3 cm
Condition: Very good
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一日一善の糸が、天（神）へ到達した時。
When the thread of one good deed each day reaches Heaven (the divine).
糸を天から見た様子。
The dots represents the appearance of the thread as seen from Heaven.
The work in this series can be seen as aerial views of Lu: The Never-Ending Thread. Instead of showing the threads rising vertically, Moriuchi depicts their tips as evenly spaced dots across the canvas. She calls these the “forefront”, the points where infinity first becomes visible, like stars scattered across the sky. The dots suggest both the ends of countless threads and the cosmic vastness that stretches far beyond them.
Inscription on the verso:
縷・Lu の先頭
The Forefront of the Neverending Thread
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Keiko Moriuchi 森内敬子 (Japanese, b.1943) is an artistic force to be reckoned with. Not only was she the final member to join the Gutai Art Association, but she was also the only member to be invited to join by Jiro Yoshihara (Japanese, 1905-1972), the collective’s founder.
Moriuchi creates paintings with stunning textures, underscored with deep spirituality. Spirituality radiates off Moriuchi’s canvases, as her compositions harken to sacred geometries and mythological symbols. Her works are almost akin to sculptural terrains, putting on layer after layer of Liquitex paint that accumulates on the canvas, which are then delicately gilded with gold. This signature use of gold leaf is not merely an aesthetic choice — as Moriuchi believes that gold has healing and purifying properties, and activates the divine energy points of the heart and mind. The heft of these surfaces embody the vigor with which Moriuchi uses to create these immensely tactile pieces, and even further, mirroring the intensity of artistic gestures of her Gutai peers.
(Photographed in October 2025)