STORIES

Hajimari Art Center organizes exhibitions with eye-catching titles like Ta-Yoriai, Ta-Yoriau (Depending on each other, together) and Yawarakaku Nattemiru (Becoming soft). How do they come up with such themes that every visitor can relate to?

KAWABE Hiroko quietly runs her colored pencils over her paper in the new studio at 〈Atelier Yamanami〉, Shiga Prefecture. A skillful portrait artist, her drawing style is characterized by smooth lines and the use of vivid colors, favoring bright, pop…

Many artists are affiliated with Atelier Yamanami in Koka City of Shiga prefecture. The studio’s activities are not limited to art-making and exhibitions but also expand into collaborations with different industries, which has gained them domestic a…

Ask anyone about SHUJI Takashi, and they will reply, “A gentle soul, rather quiet, but always ready with a smile.” This artist of few words will forever continue to speak to us through the drawings born out of the perspective of his gentle gaze.

Words and pictures meld into one in the works of TOMIZUKA Yoshimitsu. Crammed into every gap between them, a variety of colors appears to overflow the confines of the paper. We stepped into the world of Tomizuka’s mysterious stories, created by the …

It has been two years since MAENO Ikkei began oil painting, something he had been longing to do for several years. Putting on a favorite record, he paints, dances, then goes back to painting. This article captures a snapshot of the surreal and dream…

From the last years of elementary school until he was over 40, KAWAKAMI Kenji stayed home drawing. At 43 years old, he came into contact with 〈The Garden of Hope〉, where he encountered oil painting and his talents were discovered. Today, he continue…

Vivienne Sato dashingly arrived in Shinjuku Tokyo wearing a headpiece with vivid colors. Vivienne wears many different hats – an artist, film critic, drag queen, and an architect who doesn’t build. But the makeup and headpiece are for recoveri…

Immediately after graduating from high school, FUKUI Masahiro started taking an art class offered by the predecessor organization of 〈Artspace Colorful Institute〉 (hereafter, 〈Colorful〉) in Tottori City. Since that time, he has continued to attend o…

His 10B pencil gliding across the paper, INOUE Masaru serenely pursues his drawing on a sheet of rolled paper spanning two meters in width. You would never guess from his commanding drawing style, but Inoue only began engaging with art in earnest at…

Anime characters, figures from ukiyo-e woodblock prints, dinosaurs, and supernatural beings (yōkai) from Japanese folklore crowd the scene. The worlds portrayed in the works of UKAI Yuichiro of〈Atelier Yamanami〉(Shiga Prefecture) are a confusion of …

Engrossed in his embroidery work with a gentle smile always on his face, MAENO Tsutomu is a long-time participant in the nui project at Shobu Gakuen (Kagoshima Prefecture). Stubbornly sticking to his own pace, he sews slowly, stitch by stitch, the d…

In music, there are moments when sounds become an ecstatic force that transforms the space as soon as the playing starts. A performance group called “otto & orabu” which was formed by members and staff at Shobu Gakuen, facility for persons with …