Exhibitions

Soft Mirrors

Eiki Mori , Erik Swars , Jörgen Axelvall , Mariko Matsushita , Mihoko Ogaki , Ren Hang , Shinji Ihara , Yasushi Ebihara

2019-01-11   until   2019-02-02

 

KEN NAKAHASHI is pleased to present Soft Mirrors, a group exhibition, to be hold from January 11 until February 2, 2019.

Artists: Eiki Mori, Erik Swars, Jörgen Axelvall, Mariko Matsushita, Mihoko Ogaki, Ren Hang, Shinji Ihara, Yasushi Ebihara


Exhibiting Artists

Eiki Mori

BIO

Born in 1976, Ishikawa Japan. Graduated from The Photography Dept., Parsons The New School for Design in 2011. He won the 39th Kimura Ihei Award in 2014 for intimacy. Currently lives in Tokyo.

Eiki Mori is a Tokyo-based artist, known for his photography exploring themes about ‘same-sex marriage,’ diversifying ‘family forms,’ and ‘gender identities,’ through putting himself in a fictitious situation amongst his lover and friends in front of the camera. The concentration on this theme implies retrieving and connecting those who live together, a microcosmos of the social community in diversified forms and sexualities. For his practice, he uses multiple medias such as photography, videos, performance, and text.

intimacy

In the series intimacy, Eiki Mori photograph his partner for over an year since they have met, resulting in a dialectic photo book of 264 pages. In 2013, he received the most prestigious Kimura Ihei Award for this series.

Family Regained

Family Regained is an observation of the family, a sociological performance that sublimes the visual art medium, and an aesthetical or political aim to spread a visualized and acknowledgeable image. This series relies on self shot portraits taken over 3 years, picturing himself with friends and their families at their places and yards using a self-timer, and performance videos as an exploration of insight into today’s idea of ‘a family,’ documenting a fictional family’s memories composed of a man, a boy, and Mori himself, strolling around the city of Tokyo. Filtered through the fundamental color of blood, a red scenery arises apart from its surrounding society, as if it is an act from a theatre.

selected works


Book

  • Family Regained, Nanarokusha Publishing, Japan, 2017
  • Intimacy, Nanarokusha, Japan, 2013
  • tokyo boy alone, Revolution Star Publishing and Creation, Taiwan, 2011
  • CROWS AND PEARLS, Edition Nord. Japan, 2009

PRESS

Erik Swars

Erik Swars studied under Jochen Plogsties in Burg Giebichenstein Kunsthochschule Halle and graduated in 2016. He also studied from O JUN in Tokyo National University of the Arts from 2013 until 2014. He first were working the geometric landscape full of screen with vivid colors, reminiscent of the surrealism and metaphysical paintings such as New Leipzig School or Giorgio de Chirico. In the process of continuing production with his master Jochen Plogsties, in recent years his works have been becoming more minimalistic like Suiboku-ga style. “Painting capturing the moment” could be said as his work, on the multiple-layered surface made with gesso and opaque watercolor gouache supporting the various expression struck with dark blue oil painting, not to dare to paint until he is satisfied in painting his subconscious thoughts, to leave the instinctual strokes of the brush unchanged, the strength sharpen and soften and the dryness of the brush. Swars uses the image sources that he finds on a catalog of the old master paintings, or the images on the Internet. He avoids the distinct frontal nature, he draw out a spread image that leads the viewpoint in various directions.


Jörgen Axelvall

Born 1972 in Sweden. Lives in Tokyo.

Before moving to Tokyo he lived in New York City for 15 years.

He won the international winner of New Exposure Award presented by US Vogue and Bottega Veneta in 2013.

book

  • "Instant Moments" super sonic, 2014
  • "I was looking for Park Hyatt Tokyo" Park Hyatt Tokyo / amana, 2014
  • "OIDE" hand made, limited edition of three, Self published / FORT, 2015
  • "Go To Become" roshin books, 2017


Mariko Matsushita

BIO

Born 1980, in Osaka.

B.F.A in oil painting from Kyoto City University of the Arts in 2004. Lives in Tokyo.

Her solo show has been held three times at KEN NAKAHASHI, “MARIKO” in Oct. 2015, “IDO” in Oct. 2016, and “RAW” in Feb. 2018.

Matsushita received Grand Prize for the "2nd CAFAA" Award in 2016, organized by the Contemporary Art Foundation.

Sexual love and the pain upon living, are repeated subjects in Matsushita’s works. Her painting harbors powerful energy, and she produces through an intimate relationship with the model and herself.

She researches and develops her expressive outputs besides her paintings, by introducing a new spectrum of media to her body of works, including performance, video, photography, installation and writing.


Selected work


RESIDENCE

  • July - September, 2017: Delfina Foundation, London


BOOK

  • "MARIKO" published by matchbaco, 2015


COLLABORATION

  • pays des fees, 2017
  • Acha Tyumu, 2017


MEDIA COVERAGE

Mihoko Ogaki

  • bio

Born 1973 in Toyama prefecture. Graduated Aichi Prefectural University of the Arts with a major in oil painting in 1995. Graduated from the German National Kunstakademie Düsseldorf in 2004. In 2010, she moved to Tokyo. Has shown internationally, including Düsseldorf, New York, Kyoto, and Tokyo. In 2003, she received the audience award at the 57th Bergische Kunstausstellung at Museum Baden in Nordrhein Westfalen. Her works are owned by many individual collectors worldwide.

Following this exhibition, she is scheduled to have solo shows in Germany and Spain during 2018. Her works have been acquired by many individual collectors in Japan and abroad.

Ogaki works on themes of “life” and “death” through sculptures, installations, and drawings, expressing death and age with dynamic and imposing techniques. The Milky Way series is created so that light shines through numerous holes drilled on the surface of a human sculpture. Dismantling a Mercedes-Benz and decorating its parts with countless beads, before the beginning - after the end is displayed in a way in which the viewer lays down as a “corpse” in a palace-type hearse once used in Japan. The Star Tale series is a confirmation of the reality of feeling alive, along with Memento mori - the reflection of mortality.

book

  • "Mihoko Ogaki WHO" Published/Edited/Designed by Shuji Sugihara, 2013

Media

LINKS

Ren Hang

Born 1987 in Changchun, Jilin Province, China, Ren Hang is widely regarded as one of China’s top young contemporary photographers, who kept taking pictures of friends in the nude at a time when “sex” continues to be taboo in China.

Not only are his colours captivatingly vivid, they are poetic and a lyrical sensation with young men and women posing as if veritably sculptured.

He has held numerous exhibitions in several world capital cities, such as Beijing, Paris, NY and Tokyo and also participated in international art fairs on numerous occasions; Paris Photo and Photo Basel. In 2010, he won the Italy third TERNA Prize for Contemporary Art.

In 2011 he self-published the photo books “REN HANG 2009-2011” and “ROOM”. Since then, he has also published a great number of notable books.

His works are already incorporated into the public collections of several museums; Multimedia Art Museum in Russia, CAFA Art Museum in China, Spencer Museum of Art, University of Kansas, US, Three Shadows Photography Art Centre in China and the White Rabbit Contemporary Chinese Art Collection in Australia.

BOOK

  • 2016, ATHENS LOVE 雅典的爱, Session press, USA
  • 2016, 二月 FEBRUARY, Self-Published，China
  • 2016, 一月 JANUARY, Self-Published, China
  • 2015, 海鲜派对 Seafood Party, Self-Published, China
  • 2015, 上海游客 Shanghai Visitors, Self-Published, China
  • 2015, NEW LOVE 新欢, Session press, USA
  • 2015, 野生, Die Nacht, Germany
  • 2015, FOOD ISSUE, Same studio, China
  • 2014, PHYSICAL BORDERLINE, ThreeShadows +3 Gallery, China
  • 2013, THE BRIGHTEST LIGHT RUNS TOO FAST, Editions Bessard, France
  • 2013, SON AND BITCH, Neurasthenia, Taiwan
  • 2013, Republic, Éditions du LIC, Norway
  • 2013, MY DEPRESSION, Self-Published, China
  • 2012, NUDE, Self-Published, China 
  • 2011, ROOM, Self-Published, China 
  • 2011, REN HANG 2009-2011, Self-Published, China
  • 2013, Poem Collection of Renhang, Neurasthenia, Taiwan


Shinji Ihara

bio

Born 1987 in Fukuoka prefecture. Ihara obtained M.F.A. in Oil Painting Materials and Techniques at Tokyo National University of the Arts in 2012. He is currently based in Hiroshima. 

Ihara has had three major series of works so far. The LIFE series include portraits of himself and people in his life, the MATSURI series feature his hometown Fukuoka's feisty festival, the 'Hakata Gion Yamakasa', and the S series portrays painter Atsushi Suwa.

His major exhibition includes "FAUSS" (3331 Arts Chiyoda/Tokyo 2018), and 2 solo exhibitions at former matchbaco, "Hakata Gion Yamakasa Otoko E-zu" (2016), and "RENDEZVOUS" (2015).

His works are already incorporated by the Hiroshima City University Museum and the Luciano Benetton Imago Mundi Collection.

book

  • "RENDEZVOUS" published by matchbaco, 2015

COLUMN


SELECTED WORKS


Yasushi Ebihara

bio

Born 1976 in Ibaragi prefecture.

2001 M.F.A. Tokyo National University of the Arts.

Ebihara’s works range from the LUST series paintings of entwined hair, the dress series paintings of gorgeous couture items, to the exploration of single movie scenes in the NOISE series, and the Macaulay Culkin series, a symbolic child actor lost in existence.

Often inspired by small excerpts of contemporary film, his work draws attention to the fleeting beauty and tragic sentiments of existences that are exhausted by consumerism and faded away from our memories in the flow of time.

Taut and suspenseful, Ebihara’s oil paintings feature layer upon layer of delicate brushwork, while he works with sculpture, photography and performance as well. Through these various mediums, he revives the disappearing at the place of art.

BOOK

  • "tarot" published by KEN NAKAHASHI, 2017
  • "if..." published by matchbaco, 2014

MERCHANDISE

  • "Tarot CULKIN" Self-Published tarot cards, 2017