Tag Archives: Japan

Oohira Hiroshi 大平弘 (b. 1961)

Born in 1961, Oohira Hiroshi completed a Design course from the University of Osaka in 1984. A well known graphic designer who has received many prizes in Japan and abroad, Oohira is currently a Professor at the Art University in Osaka. He took up the practice of wood carving ten years ago and has been holding yearly exhibitions in Osaka and Tokyo since 2000. As Oohira is not a full time artist, he creates only ten artworks a year; his delicate sculptures are all created from cypress wood, earthly creatures that act as parody to human life and its quest for knowledge.

Awards
1996 Jury’s Special Award, Opel Design Contest
Second Award, Asahi Advertising Award
1997 Excellence Award, Mainichi Advertisement Design Competition

Accepted for International Biennial of the Poster in Mexico, Mexico, International Poster Triennial in Toyama, 2003 & 2009, Japan, Trnava Poster Triennial, Slovakia, Lahti Poster Biennial, Finland and more.

Selected Solo Exhibitions

  • Solo Exhibition, 2011, iPreciation, Hong Kong

Public Collections

  • Tokyo Opera City Art Gallery

Tomita Natsumi 富田菜摘 (b. 1986)

Equipped with a sharp eye for detail, Tomita Natsumi, a young, gifted artist from Japan, was born in Tokyo in 1986. She enrolled in an oil painting course at Tama Art University, which is located in her hometown. Since 2007, she has held several solo exhibitions participated in Asian art fairs and had her works under the collection of renowned Japanese art institutions such as the Hamada Children’s Museum of Art. On par with her witty, atypical perspectives, she uses a variety of quirky, unlikely mediums –  materials that are elementary to everyday life, and are no doubt far less employed in the artistic realm.

Tomita’s approach is youthful and rebellious as she unconventionally employs the bare essentials to convey her impressions of the world. She strives to reassess one’s role within the natural environment, specifically the lack of affinity between urbanity and nature. A potpourri of animals, vibrant and flamboyant, is paradoxically emulated using odd scraps of material, the constituents each acquiring a creative improbability, Given Tomita’s decidedly innovative streak, it is in her artistic nature to appealing simulations. Endearing, highly intuitive, and extremely imaginative, Tomita evokes a sentiment of child-like enthusiasm amongst viewers, whilst furthering a creative expansion amongst a younger audience.

Selected Solo Exhibitions

  • A Midsummer Night’s Dream, 2018, Takashimaya Shinjuku Art Gallery
  • Solo Exhibition, 2016 Kanagawa Prefectural Hall Gallery, Kanagawa / Shinjuku Kashiwajima 10F Art Gallery / Machida Tokyu Twins
  • Solo Exhibition, 2015, Shinjuku Residents Gallery, Tokyo / Korea Art Fair KIAF (Galley Tokyo Humanite)
  • Bunkamura Box Gallery, 2014, Wall Gallery, Tokyo
  • The Small Forest, 2013, Galerie 412, Japan
  • All my Newborns, 2012, iPreciation, Hong Kong
  • Solo Exhibition, 2009, iPreciation, Singapore

Selected Group Exhibitions

  • “Sogno · Dreams – Sculptor Eiji Nitahara and the Artists Carrying the Next Generation”, 2012, Sato Art Museum, Tokyo
  • “Female times Female artists now and now”, 2012, Bunkamura Box Gallery, Tokyo
  • Echigo-Tsumari Triennale “The Friends of the Kiroro Forest” Echigo Matsunoyama “The School of the Forest”, 2012,  Kiroro, Niigata
  • “Sakana Exhibition”, 2013, Hamada World Children’s Museum, Shimane
  • “The animals in the picture, Collection Exhibition 047”, 2014, Tokyo Opera City Art Gallery, Tokyo
  • “Azamino Children’s Gallery”, 2014, Yokohama Citizens Gallery Azamino, Kanagawa

Images of artworks