PREVIOUS EXHIBITIONS
The gallery has held exhibitions by an incredibly diverse range of artists spanning the globe since its inception in 1996. Catering to artists of all mediums and disciplines, the gallery space has held some of the most talented and most interesting voices working today. Additional archival information available upon request.
Fugetsu-Sha: Japanese Artist Group Show
Monday June 27th (3pm-6pm),
Tuesday June 28th - Thursday, June 30th 2022
(12pm-6pm)
Reception:
Thursday, June 30th (6pm-8pm)
![Fuugetsusha-IMG_2554[1286]_edited.jpg](https://static.wixstatic.com/media/85a16c_514521a7310b4c05a3254d8e21e50395~mv2.jpg/v1/crop/x_0,y_0,w_1512,h_892/fill/w_463,h_272,al_c,q_80,usm_0.66_1.00_0.01,enc_auto/Fuugetsusha-IMG_2554%5B1286%5D_edited.jpg)
Bob Stanley: Special Exhibition
Tuesday, May 12 - Saturday, May 16, 2020
The Estate of Bob Stanley and Georges Lavrov presents a special exhibition of Bob Stanley.
Featuring work from the 1960s to 1990s
May 12-16, 2020
Gallery Hours: 10am-6pm
Reception: Thursday May 14, 2020, 6 - 8pm
Valor by Rham Carirngton: Pop Up Photography Show
Friday, May 6 - Tuesday May 10, 2020
Alanna Miller Art Advisory Presents - Valor by Rahm Carirngton
May 6-10, 2020
Gallery Hours: 9:30am - 5pm
Fugetsu-Sha Japanese Artist Group Show 2020
Thursday, February 27 - Sunday, March 1, 2020
Reception:
Thursday February 27, 2020 5pm-7pm
Joseph Piccinotti: Unreality
Monday October 28th - Friday November 1, 2019
Unreality
Reception: Thursday, October 31st, 6pm-8pm
Keigo Morita: Tradition and Modernism
Monday October 28th - Friday November 1st, 2019
Caelum Gallery is proud to present a solo show by the painter Keigo Morita.
Morita never let's his audience forget the roots of his painting - Japanese culture, even though he embraces Western techniques and outlooks. The artist found a source of delightful textures, colors and patterns, as well as inspiration, in Kimono. He cuts them up and uses them as a base for paintings. Kimono designs are, of course, flat. Morita revels in depicting three-dimensional realty. These two - flat and full - creates a dynamic tension throughout his work. A fully described, rounded torso of a woman, or a town scene with the buildings perspective plunging towards a vanishing point, play off of the adamantly flat base of kimono. This seventy-year-old artist took up painting at age forty-five, and he approaches his art with gusto and youthfulness.
Reception: Thursday, October 31, 2019 6pm-8pm
Life In Plastic: Brave Enough to be Yourself
Thursday October 17, 2019
An Artist Exhibition: Paul Christoper Conticelli
October 17 6:30pm - 9:30pm
RSVP REQUIRED: Paulchristopherevent@gmail.com
High School Photography Winners Exhibition
Sunday October 13, 2019
October 13, 2019 11am-4pm
Jean Edouard Jr First Solo Exhibition
Saturday October 12, 2019
The Modern Day Picasso, Warhol, Basquiat, Haring
October 12th, 2019 3:30-8:30pm
IG:@IAMOSKOO EMAIL:IAMOSKOO@gmail.com
An Exhibiting of Paintings by Amy Barovick
Saturday September 21, 2019
Featuring works by:
Amy Barovick, Mark Chamberlain, Brian Gilmartin, Robert Mendez
September 21, 2019 4:30PM - 9:00PM
Fugetsu-Sha Japanese Artist Group Show 2019
Thursday August 29 - Sunday, September 1, 2019
Reception:
August 29th, 5PM - 7PM
Gallery Hours: 12pm - 6pm
September 1st: 12pm - 4pm
TEA CELL OUT - Solo NYC Art Show
Wednesday, May 15 2019
May 15, 2019: 6PM -10PM
Impressions: Contemporary Photographs
Tuesday, April 2nd, 2019
Gallery:
April 3rd-4th, 2019: 11AM - 5PM
Selected Works By:
Giles Clarke
Adriana Echavarria
Wheaton Mahoney
Giada Randaccio Skouras-Sweeny
Jewel Soirée presented by Gansevoort Magazine
Friday, March 15th, 2019 5PM - 8PM
Art House NYC Organized Art Show
Thursday, March 7th - Saturday March 9th, 2019
Reception:
Friday, March 8th, 2019 5PM - 10PM
Gallery Hours:
March 7th & 9th, 2019: 10AM -5PM
March 8th, 2019 10AM - 10PM
Fugetsu-Sha Japanese Artist Group Show 2019
Saturday March 2nd - Tuesday March 5, 2019
Reception:
March 2nd, 2019 5PM - 9PM
Gallery Hours:
March 3rd & 4th, 2019: 12PM - 6PM
March 5th, 2019: 12PM - 4PM
Rise Up: Build Brighter Futures With CUCS
Thursday, January 31, 2019 6:00 - 8:30PM
Great New York wiskey for a great New York cause.
Iron Smoke Disterly, Widow Jane, Finger Lakes Distilling, Orange County Distilling, New York Distilling Co.
Tickets on Sale: www.cucs.org/riseupwhiskey
Alonzo Adams "Broad Strokes"
Saturday, November 17th - Sunday, November18th
November 17th 12pm - 6pm
November 18th 12pm - 5pm
Jewel Soirée presented by Gansevoort Magazine
Thursday, November 15th 3pm - 9pm
Meet the designers and view their holiday collections for great gift buying possiblities!
Wine and appetizers served from 5pm -7pm
Michiko Bokka "Stillness and Movement"
Monday, October 29th - Friday, November 2nd, 12pm - 6pm
Sumi ink painting has a long and great history in Asia, and artists like Michiko Iwakura keep the tradition alive with vibrant contemporary works. The simplicity of black ink on paper belies its complexity and sophistication. The artist devisees ingenious methods of applying the ink in varied ways, producing intriguing surface effects. The brushwork is vigorous yet controlled and, although the art is abstract, the forms hint at figurative motifs. Because of Iwakura’s inventiveness, the basically black and white works avoid sameness; each work has its unique character and direction. With successful sumi ink painting, the viewer is not sure how the artist managed to execute the works; it is as though they appeared spontaneously.
Takayuki Yamada "A Piece of Cloth"
Monday, October 29th - Friday, November 2nd, 12pm - 6pm
Yamada’s new cycle of large-scale drawings is a departure for the artist. Past series were based on travels the artist took to exotic places. The new works are more internal and psychological. He seems to have decided to stay in Japan, specifically at her beaches. There, in Surrealist landscapes, the viewer encounters animals and people by the surf. They are familiar and yet unfamiliar-not distorted, but not entirely normal either. They are seated or standing on pieces of torn cloth, either on the water, like a raft, or on the sandy beach like a beach towel. The viewer is free to interpret the meaning of the cloths, and one possibility is that they represent the artists drawings. The creatures and people that he has drawn have emerged alive from the paper, which has become a bit torn from this effort. The works are in Yamada’s trademark silver-toned pencil with touches of acrylic on Japanese paper, mounted on thick German paper. The fusion of Japanese and Western aesthetics finds expression in the artists choice of materials.
"A Piece of Cloth with An Elephant" 2018
Kentaro Toda "Landscape"
Monday, October 29th - Friday, November 2nd, 12pm - 6pm
Toda is a Western style landscape painter with an Eastern artist’s outlook. His landscapes are haunting and rigorous. They seem like stages on which a drama is about to happen, but before the actors appear. The works are broadly executed without much detail, and yet the hills, buildings and waterways are entirely convincing. And yet, despite their solidity, they are dreamlike; somewhere in-between a pleasant and a disturbing dreams. The artist’s pallet is subdued and his technique is sound and straightforward, but the viewer has s sense that there is more to it than meets the eye; there is some hidden meaning in why he chose these specific landscapes to paint, and he is free to speculate about it.
IPC NY PRINTFEST 2018
Thursday, October 25th - Saturday, October 27th 2018 10am - 6pm
MFA and BFA Print Fair
Clothes Minded 2018
Wednesday, October 10th - 10am to 6pm through Saturday, October 13th, 10am to 6pm
Eco-friendly designer Isabel Varela will host a three-day exhibit, "Clothes Minded," on the malpractices of the fashion industry: mistreatment of employees, the probability of psychological damage, the insurmountable waste that occurs and more. This exhibit also features artist and National Geographic explorer Asher Jay's installation that will expand on a concept that Jay has been working on since 2012 called "Message in a Bottle" which is on permanent display at National Geographic Encounter Times Square.
Bartender Art Show
Tuesday, September 25th 2018 2-7PM
Fugetsu-sha Japanese Artists Group Show Fall 2018
Tuesday, September 4th - Friday, September 7th 2018
Fugetsu-sha returns for their 9th semi-annual group show of selected artists from Japan.
Akemi Fujita: Life of Nature
Monday, July 16th - Friday, July 20th, 2018Add Date here
Reception: Thursday, July 19th, 6pm - 8pm
Driftwood as natural art has always fascinated people. Its playful forms are so suggestive of organic life. Of course, wood, originally was a living thing, and so it is not surprising that, after being carved by water, it still seems alive. In the hands of the artist Akemi Fujita, driftwood metamorphoses into animal-like forms, but it still maintains an ocean-hewn look. One is reminded that all life originally came from the ocean. The artist augments the driftwood with clay, which comes from riverbanks- another body of water. One is also reminded of the gnarled sculptures of William De Kooning and the expressionist paintings of Chiam Soutine. Like those artists, Fujita refers powerfully to living things that display a primal energy.
art image: " pe " Driftwood, clay
L 24" x W 12" H 21.5"
Kouzo Nakashima: The Heart of The East
Monday, July 16th - Friday, July 20th, 2018Add Date here
Gou Nakashim paints with traditional Japanese media- sumi ink on fabric. Works of calligraphy in Japan are executed on cloth or paper and are then mounted on cloth or paper hanging scrolls. These scrolls tastefully echo the action and the colors in the painting and it can be a beautiful environment that enhances the painting. Nakashima dispenses with the scroll but visages of it are still present. For instance, “Ichigo Ichie”- “A One in a Lifetime Chance,” the artist executed a central panel of calligraphy in a lozenge-shaped space that is very graphic- black on white. Surrounding it, symmetrically, are four smaller black lozenges on an ochre background. This scroll-like arrangement is very arresting in its simplicity and graphic elegance.
"Ichigo Ichie - A Once In A Lifetime Chance"
Sumi ink on fabric
Mika Hidaka: Tamashii
Monday, July 16th - Friday, July 20th, 2018Add Date here
Calligraphy, symbol and abstract design intersect in Mika Hidaka’s work. Bold, and simple in execution, they evoke something ancient and vital, and indeed the characters are ancient but they are given contemporary urgency. Hiroshima Peace Park received, over the years, mounds of origami birds from people around the world who sent them as tokens of peace. There were too many to store and the park officials wisely distributed the origami for recycling. Hidaka uses the paper for her works that are executed in sumi ink. and gold paint. The characters express life in its various forms- human, animal and plant.
"ran"
Sumi ink and gold color on used orizuru paper
Fugetsu-sha Japanese Artists Group Show Spring 2018
March 12th-15th, 2018
Closing Reception: Thursday, March 15th, 6-8PM.
Fugetsu-sha returns for their 8th semi-annual group show of selected artists from Japan. Over 200 works from different schools of art will be featured, including Japanese caligraphy, paintings, mixed media works and more.
Pop-Up Exhibition: The Silhouette Collection by Emelia Lartey
February 16th, 2018
Opening Hours: 6:30-10PM
Emelia Lartey presents: "The Silhouette Collection". The Collection uses vibrant colors and juxtaposes patterns in protest of conventionality by coloring the absence and shadows of light. The Collection challenges and insists on the idea of freedom.
Pop-Up Exhibition: Ana Gallart
January 18th-19th, 2018
Jan. 18th Opening Hours: 2-8PM
Jan. 19th Opening Hours: 11AM-5PM
Solo exhibition by Argentinian artist Ana Gallart. Currated by Marisol Lozano-Molina.
"The Spatula
With it's sharp and subtle trace
Helps me tell stories
With heart and soul"
Pop-Up Exhibition: Baklava and Beats
November 4th, 2017
Opening Hours: 5-10PM
The Baklava and Beats Art Show will feature Albanian American artists from New York, in celebration of culture, raw talent, and this city we call home. Featuring a series of vendors, baklava, and complimentary drinks.
Solo Exhibition: Steve Dressler
October 23rd - November 1st, 2017
Reception: Thursday, October 26th, 6-8PM
This distinct collection of “Nonuments” are a series of collages and sculptural assemblages that lay tribute and inspiration from the history of the Pop Art movement.
Solo Exhibition: Nicholas Bergman
October 16th - 20th, 2017
Reception: Thursday, October 19th, 6-8PM
A collection of mixed media and water color works featuring stamps from around the world.
Solo Exhibition: Ikuko Ito
October 16th - 20th, 2017
Reception: Thursday, October 19th
Works of sumi ink and persimmon juice inspired by the songs of Toru Takemitsu along with a series of Japanese characters.
Pop-Up Exhibition: Eden Contemporary Art Gallery
October 14th, 2017
An exhibition of natural reflections through art and creative expression.
For more information: edencontemoraryarts.com
Pop-Up Exhibition: Robert Dallas
October 7th, 2017
Reception: Saturday, October 7th
Works by artist, designer, and brander: Robert Dallas.
For more information: borninkillercity.com
Group Show: BANGA Association NY Exhibition
October 2nd - 6th, 2017
Reception: Thursday, October 5th
Japan BANGA Association is a group that centers their exhibition on published works of the Sosaku-hanga period, a 20th century art movement based on the principle of self-expression in the form of drawings, prints, and woodcuts. For this exhibition, eleven instructors will debut their work, including: Akiko Honda, Masami Kanai, Itsuyo Harada, Mitsuyo Segawa, Naoko Sasaki, Naoko Niihata, Rikayo Okada, Sakae Sakai, Sayuri Watanabe, Tomie Yamamoto, and Yuji Yokoi.
Solo Exhibition: Michiko Bokka
October 2nd - 6th, 2017
Reception: Thursday, October 5th
Taking influence from over 50 years of practicing Ikebana (Japanese flower arrangement), Michiko Bokka adapts the organic, wistful, yet careful compositions of flowers into her ink works. At first glance, these black and white works are amorphous and fluid, like ink dropping into water or oil surfacing on puddles, but soon, specific images starts to take shape. Waves crashing against a rocky shore, mountains coming in and out of view between clouds, or a wild, exhilarating wind can be seen individually. The dark, dynamic black brush strokes blend seamlessly with the softness of a watercolor-like quality of grays; a combination that lends itself from nature, where different colors, textures, and shapes create a surprising harmony.
Solo Exhibition: Kazusa Okada
October 2nd - 6th, 2017
Reception: Thursday, October 5th
Large-scale works by KAZUSA using cloths cut by traditional Japanese fabrics from obis and water-based paint.
Fugetsu-sha: Japanese Artists Group Show
September 25th - 28th, 2017
Closing Reception: Thursday, September 28th, 6-8PM
Fugetsu-sha returns for their 7th semi-annual group show with over 200 works from different schools of art from Japan.
Flyer Art Gallery Presents: World Wide Art Show 2017
June 3rd - 27th, 2017
Opening Receptions: Saturday, June 3rd, and Friday, June 16th, 4-9PM
Flyer Art Gallery is pleased to present “World Wide Art Show - New York 2017”, an international contemporary art exhibition featuring a wide range of artists from all over the world. The event includes two separate openings on June 3rd and on June 16th, 2017, where two different visions of a complex artistic path will be presented and several schools of thought proposed, all rooted in the many different - and often opposed - artistic interpretations and investigations.
For more information about this exhibition, please visit: flyerartgallery.com
Kadija Zuniga Presents: Girls Girls Girls
May 27th, 2017
Reception: Saturday, May 27th, 5-10PM.
Girls Girls Girls is an event based on a love for art, spreading love and positivity. Curator Kadija Zuniga will feature all female talent in efforts to celebrate and empower women. Live performances, visual art, and vendors based in New York State. Buy tickets here.
Cornell University Department of Art M.F.A. Group Show: Odd Year
May 22nd - May 25th, 2017
Closing Reception: Thursday, May 25th, 6-9PM.
Caelum Gallery is pleased to host, and Cornell University’s Department of Art is proud to present, the 2017 M.F.A. Exhibition: Odd Year, curated by artist Douglas Ross, introducing the work of Madeleine Cichy (M.F.A. '17), Stevie Ada Klaark (M.F.A. '17), Diana Clarke (M.F.A. '17), Kate Huffman (M.F.A. '18), Kaleb Hunkele (M.F.A. '18), Alexander Jahani (M.F.A. '18), Jerry Lim (M.F.A. '17), Sasha Phyars-Burgess (M.F.A. '18), Gabriel Ramos (M.F.A. '18), Na Chainkua Reindorf (M.F.A. '17), Clayton Skidmore (M.F.A. '17), and Richard Zimmerman (M.F.A. '18). This unique group of M.F.A. candidates has come together serendipitously, as chance is the nature of M.F.A. classes and group exhibitions. Or was it destiny? Destiny, plain and simple, feels too disturbing a notion to entertain in our time, and unsuitable to the complicated dialogue between artworks in Odd Year which attest to both the self-possession and unity of these artists, purposively, generously and agonistically contributing to each other’s growth over time.
Gathered under a title coined by the artists, the works in Odd Year might be grouped or generalized by process and concern — Cichy, Jahani, and Reindorf’s sculptures, paintings and installations exert what color brings to bear on experiences of physicality and mutant or symbolic forms. Lim and Phyars-Burgess make photographs and photographic series that move incalculably across territories of social and first-person documentary representation. Klaark, Hunkele, and Zimmerman’s works in various mediums ask - what is so psychically confounding and humorously endearing about the everyday? Clarke and Huffman process organic abstraction through highly animate and idiosyncratic understandings of matter, image rendering and touch, while Ramos and Skidmore each draw upon longings and traumas of memory through pictorial and spatial traps or codes. — But this would be the limit of commonalities between the manifold presences and narratives elaborated by their works, each baring distinct efforts in concordance with various lineages while exemplifying artistic risk and potential today.
Returning to the seeming disorder of chance, then the taking of chances, and the implications of living an ‘odd year’; the works created by these twelve exceptional artists are brought into contrapuntal, even ricocheting conversation at Caelum Gallery, as on this occasion Jean Cocteau’s erstwhile remark, "Seeing as these things are beyond us, let's pretend to be the organizer of them," can be compounded with the ambition and readiness to take matters into our own hands.
The annual M.F.A. group exhibition in New York City is made possible by the generous support of the Cornell Council for the Arts and Cornell University’s Department of Art.
For more information about this exhibition, please visit: https://www.cornellmfashow2017.com
IAF & MORA Presents: Spring Extravaganza Art Fair
April 27, 2017
Reception: 5:30-8:30PM
The Museum of Russian Art and International Art Festival presents the Spring Extravaganza Art Fair. Featuring a diverse mix of paintings and photos by established and emerging contemporary artists, including:
Yelena Kimelblat, Alexander Rees, Elena Ab, Rena Abdelrahman, Iness Kaplun, Nadya Reshetova, Ella Kogan, Oxana Uryasev, Yelena Lezhen, Ajuan Song, Yelena Lamm, Alex AG, Grigory Gurevich, Ian Clifford, Michael Ezra, Alex Soldier.
Photo: Jewlery by Alex Soldier.
The Ardor of Spring
April 20th, 2017
Reception: 5:30-9:30PM
International Art Alliance proudly presents The Ardor of Spring, the second exhibition of works by Alliance members.
Permanence is most vividly expressed in the cyclicality of life; as long as our planet revolves around the Sun, we can always count on the vernal freshness of the world to catalyze new forms of passionate artistic self-expression.
The Ardor of Spring will feature works of painters, photographers, sculptors, jewelry and fashion designers exploring the subjects of femininity, rebirth and yearning.
The program for the night includes an art show, a fashion show, a jewelry trunk show as well as cocktails, refreshments, and sweepstakes with prizes provided by our sponsors.
Artists and Designers:
Konstantin Bokov, Olga Dmytrenko, Elena Iosilevich, Ella Kogan, Kira Koktysh, Aleks Kontr, Katya Leonovich, Lana Lanetta, Yelena Lezhen, Emil Silberman, Larisa Shamuradova, Oksana Tanasiv.
Curators: Tatyana Borodina and Yelena Lezhen
Galleria Safilo Presents: Gianluca Vassallo: American Eyes
March 31st - April 2nd, 2017
Opening Reception: Saturday, April 1st, 2017.
The entirety of the American experience is captured in the blink of an eye – the power of youth, the pride of age, the utopian purity of cinema, literature and music encapsulated in an American dream -- a poetic horizon of hope for those who believe that from complexity, a syntax of beauty and a synthesis of expanded community can be born. Sustained by Safilo Elasta and Emozioni, the clarity and focus of this American vision will be protected for the future of all who continue to dream. “American Eyes” by Gianluca Vassallo, more than photography.
More info: http://bit.ly/2nR692R
Fugetsu-sha Japanese Artists Group Show Spring 2017
March 7 - 10, 2017
Opening Reception: Thursday, March 9, 6-8PM
Fugetsu-sha returns for their 6th semi-annual group show of selected artists from Japan. Over 200 works from different schools of art will be on display, including paintings, caligraphy, mixed media, and more.
New York Art Week Show 2017
February 28 - March 6, 2017
Opening Reception: Thursday, March 2, 6-9PM
The New York Art Week is coming on its 2017 edition with a group show curated by art world leaders such as Drorit Gur Arie, Director & Chief Curator of the Petach Tikva Museum of Art in Israel, Holly Hager, distinguished patron, collector and founder of Curatious: the first art retail price index, and by John Seed, the famous art critic from The Huffington Post. Email for more information: info@newyorkartweek.org
Participating Artists:
Alexandra Averbach, Alison Belt, Andrew Galindo, Carol Sharp, Christopher Marion Thomas, Connie Freid, Daniel Rosenbaum, Donna Lomangino, Edelweiss Calcagno, Fiona Kinsella, Franklin Álvarez Fortun, George Raab, Guang Zhu, Jack Rosenberg, Jamie Martinez, Javier Infantes, Karen Lemmert, Lisa Gross, Maria Lago, Mariko Swisher, Mariusz Navratil, Michael Bignell, Natalia Berschin, Nicholas Down, Rae Broyles, Ruth Ellen Hoag, Sima Schloss, Tim Hoover, Leila Pinto
Hideki Moroboshi: Discontinuous Creates Meaning
October 4 - 15th, 2016
Opening Reception: Thursday October 6, 6-8PM
In his newest series, Hideki Moroboshi uses materials such as resin, metal powder, acrylic, and rust in combination with his large-scale digital compositions. Rather than filling the entire canvas, he plays with empty space as a digital collage. He includes incomplete figures, buildings, landscapes, along with an economic use of colors to evoke something rather sinister. Combining photography, illustration and inkwork in a digital setting allows Moroboshi the freedom to layer images together in ways that can be both precise and chaotic. Some images have very clear subjects, like the destruction of war and modern fears, while other images are ambiguous in relying only on color and movement. Either way, Moroboshi’s works can feel like a glitch. Keeping the compositions incomplete, he guides the viewer to question what’s missing.
Among his more ambiguous works, white space is rarely used. Instead, he fills the canvas with a swirl of colors that could be compared to the ocean, sunsets, or mist in a city. In comparison, his thematic works uses harsh lines, cut and paste images, as well as wide, rectangular white spaces. Despite the apparent subjects in the latter works, one could argue that the former is more symbolic. Humans, after all, have only so many images and words in our vocabulary to accurately express the way we feel. Colors fill those gaps, and can even influence our moods. Our associations to items, ideas, and people can be determined by colors. Of course, there is no single definition for each color that exists, which is why colors are a unique experience to everyone. In essence, the colors in Moroboshi’s pieces act as mirrors for the viewers to reflect on their memories, feelings, and general association with oneself.
Overall, the two sides of Moroboshi’s series are rather paradoxical. One side of his artwork invites the viewers to look at the empty space and discover what’s missing, while the other side encourages the viewers to discover themselves in a space filled with colors. The simplest explanation for this may just be that the answers we want can usually be found by looking inwards.
Takayuki Yamada: Old Testament - Ancient Records
October 4 - 22, 2016
Opening Reception: Thursday October 6, 6-8PM
A year ago, Takayuki Yamada visited Ahmedabad, India to explore their ancient stepwells—stone-lined water structures that look like kingdoms ascending into the earth. At the bottom of one of these stepwells, Yamada looked up and saw the sky shining brilliantly through the opening, despite the shadows swallowing him entirely from below. In that moment, Yamada felt all the worries that haunted his mind disappear, as if they were transported into another dimension.
This experience reminded Yamada of the Old Testament and the anthology of ancient Japanese stories called the Kojiki. In both stories, gods created the earth and humans while guiding and influencing the world from afar. To Yamada, the stepwells in India are reminiscent of the bridge between the gods and the earth in the Kojiki. This desire to communicate with the gods is evident in temples, churches, even cities born from religion. Even today, Japanese construction companies are attempting to build the so-called bridge to the universe. After visiting the stepwells, Yamada is inclined to believe that the bridge has existed for centuries.
In his newest series of drawings, Tadayuki Yamada represents this universal bridge between the earth and the gods. Through black and white images using pencil, acrylic, and usumino paper, Yamada pays homage to the stepwells and the magnificent intelligence of their creators. Dramatic chiaroscuro occurs from the gaping sky, or the moon in space, highlighting the intricate architecture of the stepwells and drowning out anything below the earth’s surface. In these shadows, human figures and animals are present, but sparse. While there are only one or two bodies present in each drawing, Yamada solely uses female figures. This may have to do with the fact that in the Kojiki, there is the goddess of the sun and the universe named Amaterasu. The connection between the gods and humans, therefore, can exist both in its transportational form as a bridge, or the physical form of a woman. The figures drawn onto physical layer of the usumino paper acts both as a symbolic layer between the earth and the universe, and a binding element between us and the gods. Through these drawings, one can imagine a truth that goes beyond today’s standards of reality.
Fugetsu-sha Japanese Artists Group Show
September 26 - 30, 2016
Opening Reception: Thursday September 29, 6-8PM
Fugetsu-sha returns for their 5th semi-annual group show of selected artists from Japan. Featuring over 250 works from different schools of art, including paintings, caligraphy, ink drawings, and more.
ant mk.
September 1 - 10, 2016
Opening Reception: September 1, 2016
"Our creative process begins with inspiration from everyday life. It’s not flashy, it’s a simple and accumulative process much like the activity of an ant. The traveling ant leaves a trail of pheromones from his footsteps and other ants react and move forward. Our art work also releases a certain type of creative pheromone. Our “ant mark” fills the space of the exhibition hall. We hope that people are inspired by our mark and continuemoving forward in their everyday lives."
- atsumi, noriko, toru, mitsuru and kakuko
Featuring: Astumi Murata, Noriko Amano, Toru Kurita, Mitsuru Kuroki, Kakuko Ishii
Rumi Yanagisawa
June 7 - 11, 2016
Opening Reception: Tuesday, June 7, 6-8PM
Rumi Yanagisawa is an award winning seed bead artist who is bringing beaded designs to the forefront of fashion. Taking motifs from nature, the artist immortalizes the beauty of flowers through the intricate process of weaving beads into a wearable art. From far away, one would be able to distinguish leaves and flowers imbedded on a vine made of lace. Upon closer inspection, the flowers take on a more metallic, fantasy look, as if the flowers came from another world altogether. It is in these designs that the fashion designer becomes the artist: to be able to wear these beaded pieces works both as a fashion statement and as a symbolic reminder of how nature has been and will always be an essential part of our lives.
Shin: Happiness of Angels and Children
June 7 - 11, 2016
Opening Reception: Tuesday, June 7, 6-8PM
Fantasy and innocence are classic themes of Japanese anime and manga culture that is honored by Japanese computer graphic artist Shin. Through the style of manga illustration, the artist evokes familiar feelings of joy experienced when picking up a manga as a child. Angels who quietly observe and protect, children laughing without a care in the world, and creatures born from nature are some of the many characters that can be found in these comic books from our childhood. Such characters are beloved for their ability to bring joy wherever they are. Rather than following a plotline, the artist chose to highlight these key figures in single frames. Setting them against a dreamy, soft background filled with flowers and clouds, these characters are immortalized.
Naoko Sasaki: Wings
June 7 - 11, 2016
Opening Reception: Tuesday, June 7, 6-8PM
Naoko Sasaki’s painting series, “Wings”, resembles the feeling one would experience right before waking up from a dream. There is haziness to the picture, although colors are bold and vivid. As if a blurry snapshot was taken before her eyes fluttered open, the artist captured the single image of a pair of wings. In this painting series, these wings stand alone without a bird or an angel to carry them off. They remain open against a backdrop of a soft, nonintrusive color. Wings are universally recognized as a symbol of freedom. It is this symbol that the artist highlights more so than the wings themselves. Much like the experience of finding a face in the shadows, the artist plays with the vision of her viewer to get at the heart of what freedom means to them.
Tadayuki Noguchi: Songs of Indio
May 24 - June 4, 2016
Opening Reception: Thursday, May 26, 6-8PM
Tadayuki Noguchi is a Japanese artist whose art fuses East and South rather than East and West. His series of works, “Song of Indio”, take on traditional Japanese art in the format of watercolors on paper mounted on rectangular hanging scrolls, while his themes are exclusively the life of the Peruvian people. The artist’s sincere love of Peruvian culture, and his tenderness in depicting it, marries seamlessly with his own Japanese artistic roots. At the top of each scroll is a relatively small outdoor motif such as a mountain, a village or just the sun. Below this, he arrays an aspect of Peruvian life, such as an outdoor market, people interacting with llamas, a ceremony and the like. The background is always blank white, and the depictions stand out boldly in front of it. Scale is often mixed so that a major figure is far larger than lesser figures in a scene, or a town is far smaller than the people, and in this way there is a folk quality to the art, despite the sophistication of the presentation and technique. The works can be as large at five feet, but the scenes are intimate, and the artist never crowds his compositions, leaving plenty of air around the depictions of Peruvian life. Noguchi has been traveling often to Peru from Japan for two decades, and he has focused on traditional life there, without many of modern conveniences, and he shines a warm, humanistic light on it.
Supported by Consulate General of Japan in New York.
Kaoru Okuda: Reborn
May 24 - June 4, 2016
Opening Reception: Thursday, May 26, 6-8PM
Since the Heian period, there is a belief among the Japanese in the beauty of all things transient, known as “mono no aware”. The inevitable demise of the people you love, the cherry blossoms in the spring, and the happiness you hold now are all things which are made more beautiful by their short life on earth. For years, Japanese authors and artists have highlighted the theme of “mono no aware” as a bittersweet and romantic instrument for their works. Japanese painter Kaoru Okuda, however, embraces a more modern concept for her paintings: rebirth.
Through motifs of plants and naked human figures, and by using distinct lines to fill in the tight frame, the artist focuses on the way one can be reborn a thousand times in their lifetime, no matter how short that may be. The cherry tree does not bloom just once in its entire existence. The death of a loved one does not mean you will never love again. In weaving together pastel colors against layers of solid backgrounds, the artist reminds the viewer that despite the constraint of time that boxes you in, you are free to start over. Ultimately, the lines creating these shapes and figures are a unifying agent that plays with the colors of spring, a symbol of the continuity of life. From far away, the images appears to take on an amorphous, moving entity, like a fish swimming in water. Looking at it closer, one can find small, dancing figures, bursts of flowers that have newly opened, and profiles of faces that look beyond the box they are contained in. Okuda honors the long history of “mono no aware” in her colorful, mystical art work by elevating the beauty of life’s cyclic nature in life beginning before it can ever end.
Cornell University M.F.A. Group Exhibition: Something Came Over Me
May 17 - 21, 2016
Opening Reception: Thursday, May 19, 6-9PM
Featuring: Madeleine Cichy (M.F.A. '17), Stephanie Clark (M.F.A. '17), Diana Clarke (M.F.A. '17), Carolyn Benedict Fraser (M.F.A. '16), Frances Gallardo (M.F.A. '16), Jesse Kreuzer (M.F.A. '16), Ann Lee (M.F.A. '16), Jerry Lim (M.F.A. '17), Annie Raccuglia (M.F.A. '16), Na Chainkua Reindorf (M.F.A. '17), Clayton Skidmore (M.F.A. '17), and Luca Spano (M.F.A. '16). Learn more at: http://aap.cornell.edu/news-events/cornell-mfa-group-exhibition-2016-something-came-over-me
James Nazz: Fragile
March 22 - April 8, 2016
Opening Reception: March 24th, 2016. 6 - 8PM
Photo Credit: Erwin Brown
Using eggs as a medium of choice is unusual in and of itself, but sculptor James Nazz creates heart-wrenchingly relatable and symbolic sculptures that are realized and elevated with eggs. From family figures to life events, Nazz re-imagines emotional scenarios that are familiar to our everyday lives, all while bringing perspective to how delicate, intricate, and beautiful these moments are--much like the egg.
Caelum Gallery is proud to exhibit James Nazz’s first solo show, Fragile, a series of sculptures using eggs, shell and all, as the main ingredient for his storytelling.
For over 30 years, Nazz has been building his sculptures as a way of re-imagining events, emotions, people, and items familiar to our everyday lives. The egg on its own is an object of loaded symbolism. This enabled Nazz to combine the egg with different materials to realize and elevate his individualized stories. Nazz has gone through hundreds of real eggs (sourced from his local restaurant and supermarket) and carefully filled them with plaster, so that they can stand in their natural form while imbedded in a surrealistic fashion.
Nazz’s creative relationship with eggs began back when he was a painter making egg tempera for his paintings. One day, after stacking eggshells on top of one another as an attempt at organization, he unknowingly began his first sculpture known as “Genesis”, which took on a phallic form. The symbolic irony of this sculpture--“a female object creating something male”--catapulted Nazz to where his art stands today.
In his self-published book, The Art of James Nazz, he writes: “Eggs represent a life form, neither gender or species specific. This versatility, fragility of the shell, and beauty of its texture and color allows me to combine the eggs with other objects and situations with conflicting realities and of human feelings. The egg is nourishment, an object that almost everyone on earth is familiar with, and knows what it is from an early age.
What do you expect to happen when you drop an egg?”
Travis Durden: Myths and Idols
March 22 - April 8, 2016
Opening Reception: March 24th, 2016. 6 - 8PM.
Caelum Gallery is proud to exhibit Travis Durden’s first show in New York City. His photography series, Myths & Idols, explores the creation of legends in both ancient civilizations and today.
Inspired by the Greco-Roman sculptures in the Louvre, Durden digitally combined the heads of Star Wars characters to match the marbled look of those ancient figures. By creating a seamless integration of the marble statues to modern cultural icons, Durden reminds us of how much our own pop culture is influenced by stories from a distant past. For the Greeks and Romans, their gods served important moral roles in their everyday lives. In comparison, Star Wars and its characters draw upon classic themes of “good” versus “evil” with a science fiction twist.
With the figures purposefully cropped, emphasis is placed on the upper half of the bodies, where details of these “statues” are magnified in ways that are unavailable to viewers in reality. Marks from years of wear and tear, patchy patterns on the marble, and lights and shadows that fall on the figures bring on a surrealistic element to these mythical beings. How would our own idols in Star Wars survive throughout the ages? Would they remain as unblemished as the surface of the marble, or would they eventually succumb to dirt and scuffs from generation to generation?
In an interview with the Hartford Courant, Durden comments on his series: “By mixing the two periods, I hope to bring people to think back on how we consume culture, and to realize that nothing in ‘Star Wars’ would have been imagined if it hadn’t been for past heroes written a long time ago, in lands far far away.”
Group Exhibition: Dancing Backwards in High Heels
March 15 - 19, 2016
Opening Reception: Thursday, March 17th, 6-8PM
"Sure [Fred Astaire] was great, but don't forget that Ginger Rogers did everything he did, backwards…and in high heels." - Bob Thaves
Women's History Month calls for the reflection of the incredible achievements, perseverance, and sacrifices women have made in the face of adversity and oppression. While much has improved for women since, say, Ginger Rogers' time, in the modern art world, many major museums represent less than 30% of women artists; a figure which goes to show that to this day, women are still dancing backwards in high heels. This week, Caelum Gallery celebrates some of the many contemporary artists who tirelessly enrich the arts.
We are proud to exhibit the following artists: Marie-Helene Beaudry, Natalie Brasington, Myrna Minter-Forster, Misuzu Takemoto, and Kumi Yamamoto.
HeForShe Arts Week
March 8 - 15, 2016
Enjoy the arts this week with our upcoming events and support a more gender equal world. Learn more about our initiative at: HeForSheArtsWeek.org
NYCDPW: Chromatic Visions Group Exhibition
March 12, 2016
Reception: Saturday, March 12, 2016. 4-8pm
NYCDPW, a prominent digital photography education group in New York City, is proud to present the one-day show of Chromatic Visions, a group photography exhibition of up-and-coming artists. For more information, click here.
Art Takes Manhattan: Extended Consciousness
March 3 - 6, 2016
Opening Reception: March 3, 6 -9PM
40 artists from all over the world are selected to be curated in an exciting exhibition by Art Takes Manhattan.
YANNICK FOURNIÉ MARTIN TREMBLAY ROB FIOCCA PAUL MORRIS BRYAN CHRISTIE CORNELIA KAVANAGH
JAVIER INFANTES CECILIA SCHMIDT ALEJANDRO DRON MIRIAM COSTANZA CATHERINE JANSENLARSON HONORATA JARNUSZKIEWICZ
JOHAN ANDERSSON PERRI NERI JAMIE MARTINEZ JAN KALÁB BARBARA KRUPP MARKKU LAHDESMAKI
LEN BERNSTEIN BRIGHART CECIL ECIAM MATTHEW JAMES VICKY TALWAR JANINE ROBERTSON
MICHAEL BORONIEC APRIL ZANNE JOHNSON VERONIKAH GRAUBY RANCE JONES RICHARD NOCERA MARIA TRILLO
ANNA VANMATRE LAUREN CUTLER STEPHEN HALL ROGER REUTIMANN ALEJANDRO GUTIERREZ ALEJANDRA LOPEZ-ZABALLA
ARTURO MALLMANN THEKLA PAPADOPOULOU MICHELLE REID AUDREY SHACHNOW
"Art is an experience of the mind in its creation and its reception, mediated by the artwork and its aesthetic qualitative truths. But where does the mind cease to exist and the artwork commence independently? And where does art give way to other aesthetical phenomena before the conscious beholder?"
Fugetsu-sha: 4th Japanese Artists Group Show
February 25 - March 2, 2016
Opening Reception: Feburary 25, 2016
Fugetsu-Sha returns to Caelum Gallery with their group show featuring over 250 works by Japanese artists from different schools of art.
Winter International Group Show
January 5th - 16th, 2015
Opening Reception: January 14th, 2016
Caelum is proud to start the new year with its bi-annual international group show featuring photography by Lil-Kirana (Japan), photography by Yuji Iwasaki (Japan), multi-media works by Maggie Ens (USA), oil paintings by Stacy Smith (USA), and oil on paper works by Amelie Ducommon (France).
Selected Artists Group Show
December 1st-19th, 2015
Opening Reception: Thursday, December 10th, 2015
From paper to wood to battery-powered lights, each of these artists use an array of explorative techniques and mediums to showcase their individualistic approach to greater understanding and self-expression. Featuring: Luiza Aistella, Marie-Helene Beaudry, Maggie Ens, Mariko Ishikawa, Kagii, Taras Polataiko, and Misuzu Takemoto.
Nicholas Bergman: Collage Collection
October-November, 2015
Opening Reception: October 15th, 2015
Poetry and art have had a long, budding history of influence over one another, yet this union is rare to find as a whole. In Nicholas Bergman’s collages, poetic observations of nature and people take on new shapes through vibrant colors, textures, and patterns. While the text only occupies a small corner of the canvas, it leaves just as powerful an impression as the visual of the collage itself. With just one or two lines accompanying the works, individual stories unfold with unexpected detail. Whether the canvas is layered with delicate tissue paper or inexplicable colors, the artist invites the viewer to travel the world, or simply to stop and smell the flowers with him with each layer uncovered.
Fugetsu-Sha: Japanese Artists Group Show
September 29th-October 3rd, 2015
Opening Reception: October 1st, 2015
Japanese artists group show featuring 245 works and 106 artists.
Jerry Madson: The Magic Turtle
September 15th-26th, 2015
Opening Reception: September 17th, 2015
Motifs free a painter from having to come up with new imagery for each canvas so that he can devote his energies to executing his paintings, but finding an inspiring motif is sometimes the most difficult part of the process. Jerry Madson has no such difficulties because he recognizes strong motifs all around him in the natural world in Minnesota where he lives and works. From the plethora of life forms in nature, for each of his series, Madson culls just one and then thoroughly investigates it. The artist has done this multiple times with flowers and insects that are delicate and ephemeral, but for the current series he chose a reptile -the turtle- that is absolute opposite. Madson’s past choices always had decorative qualities such as the wings of a butterfly that easily integrate into his phantasmagorical world.
The turtle, while its shell does provide a decorative pattern, is a ponderous presence that dominates the pictures. The artist quotes from earlier motifs in order to further emphasize the turtle’s pictorial dominance, but his conceit is that the turtle is magical and that the future can be read in the pattern of its shell. Madson liberally places the initial T around the compositions in Gothic lettering that is in keeping with the reptile’s formal and magical presence. Humans are also present, but in far off buildings whose remoteness, by contrast, enlarges the turtle to the dimensions of a dinosaur. This is Madson’s key and consistent endeavor – enlarging a life form that would otherwise be marginalized, to great prominence and significance.
Yoshinobu Sato: Between Consciousness and Unconsciousness, I Walk Up and Down Today, Too
September 15th-19th, 2015
Opening Reception: Thursday, September 17th, 2015
Painter Yoshinobu Sato uses unevenly cropped paper covered with acrylic as his surface for his works, which resembles the grey roughness one would find on a slab of stone. With black paint as his only medium, the artist places dots, holes, spaces, and movement sparingly throughout his canvas, creating shapes without using any lines. Sato achieves a universal feeling of controlled chaos found both in nature and humanity through the bareness of his grey canvas and in the bold splatters of black paint, reminiscent of sumi-e and abstract expressionism.
Sato relies on the natural forces of dripping paint to emulate some of the complexities and frustrations that come with being an artist: where some of the best ideas come in your dreams, and no ideas come at all when you truly want them to. It would be a mistake to compare his painting techniques to that of Jackson Pollack’s, not simply because of their difference in style and scale, but because Pollack’s paintings were products of his emotional and mental expressions, whereas Sato’s works are inspired by concepts that are not so tangible in a conscious state. Sato does not attempt to fight for a form of expression; instead, he patiently lets the expression take its own form through the careful manipulation of gravity.
Summer International Group Show
June 2015
Opening Reception: Thursday, June 18th, 2015
Kunio Imamaura (Japan), Takayuki Yamada (Japan), Masahiko Iwanami (Japan), Maire-Helene Beaudry (Canada), Antonella Sissa (Italy), Amelie Ducommon (France), Nicholas Bergman (USA), Cleo Bergman (USA), Maggie Ens (USA), and Joe Tuck (England)
Kunio Imamura: Nature and Light
May 2015
Opening Reception: Thursday, May 28th, 2015
Nature photography in the American school of Ansel Adams centers on a majestic, awe-inspiring approach to landscape that befits a vast and varied country like America. Imamura photographs the landscapes of the small island country of Japan, and it is understandable that he emphasizes a more intimate approach to landscape. Although he is a color photographer, he treats the medium like black and white photography, making strong tonal contrasts centrally important. Light and dark, in his works, are visual metaphors for opposites in human nature as well as in nature herself.
The artist does not recognize a difference between art that is made by hand, such as painting and sculpture, and photography that is made by way of a mechanical device. He declares that the war is won and photography is an integral part of the sweep of fine art history. An observer cannot help seeing in his works the strong influence of traditional Japanese screen painting. Even though his prints are small in comparison to screens, they give the impression of panoramic scale with simple motifs such as a stand of tress in sunlight or the ocean at ebb tide under moonlight.
Masamitsu Iida: Soul and Shape
May 2015
Opening Reception: Thursday, May 21st, 2015
The genre of animal sculptures that had its beginnings in prehistory is surprisingly durable. Examples of current practitioners are Barry Flanagan and his playful rabbits, and Tom Otterness with his bulbous menagerie. Contemporary artists such as these emphasize charm and whimsy in their animal depictions, in contrast to the 19th Century approach of naturalism that was epitomized by Antoine-Louis Barye. Iida’s sculptures are firmly in the contemporary camp, and he takes, as his premise, that his delightful animal sculptures will appeal to adults by bringing them back to the innocent age of childhood.
Iida’s art differs from the former two artist because, while they cast their works in bronze, he works in stone. The artist chooses to retain clues to the original shapes of the stones he works with, and he emphasizes equally the material and the animal forms. Of course there is a built-in contradiction between inanimate stone and living creatures, but the tension between the two builds to a point at which the viewer accepts that life animates the stone. Technically, the artist works his forms in large masses, avoiding cumbersome details, and he enlivens them with incisions- lines that enhance the description of the animals’ anatomy and adds light, decorative elegance to the sculptures.
Morimoto Toshimichi: This is Who I Am
April-May 2015
It could be said that all exhibitions by artists are self-portraits, insofar as the choices of motif, style and technique say a great deal about the person behind the art. Toshimichi, titling his show “This Is Who I am”, brings the self-portrait idea front and center, although it is clear, at first sight, that his paintings are not self-portraits in the usual sense of the artist painting his reflection in a mirror.
The standout and enviable characteristics of the works, and the artist’s view of himself, are serenity and clarity. Blue entirely dominates the show and it grades gently from darker to lighter in every picture. Interspersed, here and there in these blue fields, are perfectly rendered bubbles, of various sizes. That is all the visual information the artist gives the viewer who is free to choose any interpretation. The pictures might depict air bubbles under water, or soap bubbles against sky or a metaphor of some sort. The artist, painting in acrylics on paper mounted on board, presents a severe minimalism that is, paradoxically, rich and vivacious.
Yoshiko Yoshino: Reach to Fukushima
April-May 2015
Yoshiko Yoshino exhibition is a tribute to the victims of the triple disaster in Fukushima in 2011. She herself was born and raised in the center of the affected town.
Yoshino uses mainly stainless steel for her sculptures, and the material usually has a hard, cold clean look. However, Yoshino transform the material and give it a soft, tender and welcome atmosphere by making shape and curves with it. The surface of stainless steel reflects light and shadow, color of environment, and although it has heft, the artist give it a look of weightlessness.
Besides the metal sculpture, Yoshino shows "YU-ART" which means 'Playful art'. Usually she uses abstract painting as a base and stick pins into it. She then uses elastic gums to bridge the pins, and these configuration can be changed over time. Thus the base of the paintings become different art works as many times as the combinations are changed. In this show she uses as the base newspaper articles about the recovery progress of Fukushima and the nuclear plant. She has invested in them her deep emotion and strong hope for the welfare of her hometown of Fukushima.
Takayuki Yamada: Kingdom of God
April 2015
Takayuki Yamada is a draughtsman who draws on a large scale, ten feet or more. This scale works to his advantage in depicting his theme of a vast heaven. His vision of heaven is partially terrestrial in that it is located on a ceiling of clouds that is either punctured by a mountain peak or appears to just cover it. It is a lonely heaven, unpopulated by anything visible besides clouds, but it is majestic. In each picture there is a single witness to this vision, a male or female. They seem to be visitors like Dante in the Divine Comedy, and they sit, levitating, enjoying the immense expanse before them.
The works are on two layered papers with conte pencil and sumi ink on western paper mounted on a panel, with highlights in acrylic paint on Japanese paper. The vision the artist creates is in grey scales from dark to light that enhance the cloud motif. The viewer can speculate on Yamada’s intent. Are the works meditations on the afterlife or on the dichotomy of the physical, the mountain and the figures, and the spiritual as represented by amorphous clouds? His intent aside, the works are ambitious, mysterious and moving.
Yamada has happened to have curiosity and interest to find the meaning of the story in old bible recently. He found the reality of the creation of the world according to the proof by advanced science research. The works in this exhibition were made after he traveled in Bokhara, Nepal. There he flew on the cloud by ultra light plane like a hung rider with engine and saw magnificent earth through bird eye.
He imagined that the country of God will appear eventually.
Kaoru Okuda: Freedom
March 2015
Kaoru Okuda’s dream-like mixed media works are complexly composed, while the figures that populate them, that are often flying in the air, are simply defined. The artist mixes collage with drawing in making densely layered images, and the over-all effect is robust and cheerful.
Using acrylic board, the artist sometimes applies three-dimensional objects like beads, or cuts the boards and assembles them in colored sculptures. The works are characterized by playfulness that is informed by sound craftsmanship.
The title of the exhibition ‘Freedom” applies to the artist’s taking her work, from picture to picture, in any direction she pleases, instead of fixing on a single format or motif, and to experimenting technically in a variety of media.
Harutaki Toku: World of Children
March 2015
Haruaki Toku is a Japanese illustrator of children’s publications. Trained in oil painting, the artists now works in acrylic on a ground that is prepared with sand texture that gives the works their characteristic grittiness. Toku’s style, however, is the opposite of gritty and is uniformly sunny and cheerful. Playful animals in natural settings that brim with fun and adventure populate Toku’s world.
The artist’s robust technique, however, avoids the over-saccharine quality of much of the ‘super-flat’ trend in the fine art of Japan. Although there is no stylistic resemblance between Toku’s art and that of Maurice Sendak, because there is so much sunlight in both their art, there are also resulting shadows that, although not menacing, introduce somber moods that children sometimes experience and can relate to.
Although Toku can be wildly inventive, he is careful to maintain visual logic and consistency that makes even the most outlandish images convincing.
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