Stars and The Mirror, 2012, oil on canvas, courtesy of the artist and Tomio Koyama Gallery, Tokyo

Wednesday 12 September – Sunday 14 October 2012

The Sea by Night and Day by Toru Kuwakubo

At the Japan House Gallery

Organised by the Daiwa Anglo-Japanese Foundation

The Sea by Night and Day was an exhibition containing a new body of work by Toru Kuwakubo. Following his VOCA awarded work, Study of Mom (2011), he explored the idea of the sea as the origin of life, in contrast to its associations with fear and destruction, especially in post-tsunami Japan. In this first solo show in London, Kuwakubo experimented by dividing the exhibition spaces into day and night to invite viewers to navigate through his world.

Toru Kuwakubo’s work seeks to question the nature of artistic practice. In adopting the persona of fictional painter Kuwoud Bonet, a character inspired by the work of the Impressionists, Kuwakubo explores clichés of ‘Art’ and ‘The Artist’. His paintings depict everyday objects set within vibrant seascapes; their thick layers of richly coloured pigment imbuing a deep sense of nostalgia. Though originating from his personal experience, the paintings appear as if they are fiction from the artist’s mind.

Toru Kuwakubo was born in 1978 in Kanagawa, Japan. After graduating from Tama Art University in 2002, he was awarded the 3rd Koji Kinutani Prize by Mainichi Newspapers in 2011 and the VOCA Encouragement Prize in 2012. Selected exhibitions include Portrait Session, Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art, Hiroshima (2007), Out of Noise, GALLERY HYUNDAI, Gangnam Space, Seoul (2010), and Telling of Sea, Telling of Painter, Tokyo Wonder Site Shibuya, Tokyo (2010). Kuwakubo’s work is included in major collections in Japan, including the Toyota Art Collection, Takamatsu City Museum of Art, Takahashi Collection, the Flowerman Collection and The Dai-ichi Mutual Life Insurance Company. Kuwakubo is represented by Tomio Koyama Gallery, Japan.