referred to a roundtable discussion held on the occasion of the Ninth Contemporary Art Exhibit, known as Mainichi-ten that commenced in May 1969 where Sekine mentioned a changing face of art production and renounced the position of the modern subject that has been passed down since the Renaissance period. Following his experience in Venice, Sekine established the Environmental Art Studio in 1973 to work on public sculpture. His success at the Venice Biennale led to him being offered a number of solo shows in Europe, including a traveling exhibition featuring a major body of sculptural work, Phase of Nothingness—Black (1978–79)(空相—黒). Phase Of Nothingness—Black Phase of Nothingness—Black (1978–79) (空相—黒) is a lesser-known but equally important series, consisting of black FRP sculptures that contrast the natural and the manmade. The approximately 50 sculptures range from rough, clod-like forms that lie low on the floor to highly polished, geometric shapes that stand tall like totems. These works marked a crucial shift in Sekine’s practice—away from a focus on raw materials and malleability and toward the surface qualities of solidified forms. Sekine deliberately made it difficult to identify the material used to create these works—at first glance it is not evident whether they are made of stone, glass, metal, or plastic. When Sekine installed these works, he considered their placement to be a “topological scene” governed by aesthetic principles similar to those found in Zen rock gardens—namely, asymmetric arrangements of disparate elements that combine to represent a broader landscape of seas, islands, and mountains. Intellectual Exchange With Lee Ufan In November 1968, Sekine met the Korean-born artist Lee Ufan, who was soon to be of central importance to Mono-ha and the articulation of its ideas. Lee had studied a variety of philosophies, including the writings of Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu (which also came to influence Sekine’s work), and after moving to Japan in 1956, had studied modern Western philosophy at Nihon University. Lee recognized the progressiveness of Sekine’s ideas and admired his work, while Sekine found in Lee a theoretician to support his artistic practice and views of art. He knew, from his study of the postwar avant-garde, that a new art like his needed an equally new language in order for him to make a lasting mark in history. Thus, to Sekine, Lee was an answer to his search. In a series of commentaries that appeared in various art magazines from 1969