Nothingness (Kyomu)

Created in 2010 and held at the Art Institute of Chicago, Nothingness (Kyomu) is a color woodblock print that takes the Buddhist concept of emptiness as its subject. The Japanese word kyomu carries connotations of void, absence, and the illusory nature of material reality, themes that have preoccupied Japanese philosophy and art for centuries. Goto translates this philosophical territory into abstract visual form, using the woodblock medium's capacity for gradation and layered transparency to evoke space that is simultaneously full and empty. The print's abstract vocabulary, built from fields of color rather than recognizable imagery, aligns with the idea that nothingness is not blank absence but a state pregnant with potential. The work measures the distance between what the eye sees and what the mind perceives.