Upcoming exhibitions
Fumiya Watanabe from June 13 Thu. to 23 Sun.
*On the first day of the exhibition when Fumiya Watanabe will be scheduled to be in the gallery, we have decided to receive clients by appointment only.
If you plan to visit his exhibition on the first day, please make a reservation previously from the following time schedule;
①12:00-13:00
②13:00-14:00
③14:00-15:00
④15:00-16:00
⑤16:00-17:00
⑥17:00-18:00
⑦18:00-19:00
msb gallery is pleased to present “Line Lands”, a solo exhibition by Naoko Nishitani.
Dots connect to form lines, and lines expand rich imagination.
Naoko Nishitani, who treasures the experiences and sensations of her childhood, expresses her unique worldview in which various plants and living things are juxtaposed.
In this exhibition, using the concept of "lemma" as a key, she attempts to develop mysterious works in which a fragment of memory painted on a triangular canvas can be connected from anywhere to anywhere. Is it a dream, or a world inside a mirror?
We hope you will enjoy these ever-changing works that allow you to slip into a fairy tale.
Artist statement
When you make dots out of things you sense, and connect those dots, a "line" appears.
The things we see and touch have outlines, but no lines. But as soon as you replace the outlines with lines, the shapes take on meaning and can become a common language.
The images that lines create are not as clear as written words, photographs, or images, but they hold infinite possibilities with imagination and how they are perceived...
Isn't that the charm of lines, not found in words, photographs, or images?
My father was a radio operator on an ocean-going cargo ship, so he was rarely at home except for a few weeks of vacation a year until I entered junior high school. At the time, there were few means of communication, and the occasional airmail was my precious contact with him. As I let my imagination expand and expand from the short letters my father, who was not a prolific writer, wrote to my mother, the image of my father traveling on a huge ship far across the ocean was born in my head as a bottle ship... It stimulated my imagination, but the image of a bottle ship was born of the touch of glass through which it was felt.
One time, I went to Innoshima to visit my father at the dock (a port where the ship calls for inspection), and the color of the ocean I saw there and the feel of the waves were my first experience of the "sea." My encounter with a sea anemone while exploring a cave on a small island in the Seto Inland Sea became the entrance to "another world," and I feel like it was a formative experience in which the dots connected to form a line.
Can we really achieve a high level of reality with AI technology that is independent of human hands and that allows us to imagine anything?What is the true nature of reality? Where is art heading? I was asking myself these questions when I happened to watch a lecture by Shinichi Nakazawa. I became fascinated by the intellectual processes that the ancient Greeks conceived: "logos" and "lemma."
The function of the brain, which logically understands things in terms of causality and time, is very close to the function of "logos", while "lemma" is the function of the mind to grasp the whole of what is in front of us. Lemma is the idea that everything, including things that are not apparent, is connected...
I don't have enough vocabulary or knowledge to explain it well here, but ever since I was a child, I have had the sense that all life (insects, animals, people) is equal, that the distant land and the land under my feet are connected by the sea, and that there are countless mysterious living things living on land (under the ground) and in the sea (under the sea). For me, who enjoys finding similarities between humans and other animals and plants as if playing on the shore, far away from any specific religious concepts or ideas, the ancient Greek concept of "lemma" resonated with me. It was as if I had received a very important hint, even if it was just for my own sake. Without being bound by causality, I would like to aim for an exhibition that, however humble, allows people to feel the present, "dreaming of the future with the infinite life in the earth and the water," based on the reality.
Once again, I’d like to express my sincere gratitude for this valuable exhibition opportunity.
Naoko Nishitani
msb gallery is pleased to present “Etching Exhibition”, a solo exhibition by Kotaro Miura.
As if connecting dots to draw constellations, he engraved on a copper plate for a long time to express his thoughts on the universal blue world of the starry sky.
We hope that you will take this opportunity to enjoy this new works that experiment with more sophisticated techniques and expressions.
Artist statement
The starry sky has long been a source of imagination for people, and has spun many traditions and legends from all over the world in the past as well as the present.
It is a world beyond human reach, and it evokes emotions similar to curiosity and awe.
What is beyond the sky? What must be burning to make the light shine so brightly?
When we look up at the sky, I am sure the emotions of people of ancient times are still there, and I believe it is a distant communication.
Aren't the stars weaving together such universal thoughts?
Just as dots of light connect to form constellations…
In today's suffocating daily life overflowing with information and things, the sky has been there unchanged for thousands of years, and it is the starting point of my own creativity.
It is a faraway, out-of-reach place, but it is also a blue world full of infinite possibilities and playfulness, and I’d like to express these feelings in my work.
Kotaro Miura
msb gallery is pleased to present “Seeing the ambiguity”, a solo exhibition by Keita Sakai.
Keita Sakai has been creating works with an interest in cognition and its principles, using "human error" as a clue.
At first glance, the visual repetition and symbolism that frequently appear in his works seem to be in the lineage of minimal/op art, but their origins lie in his personal experience with dyslexia (a reading disability) and literacy. This is due to related errors (letters looking like patterns) and unique cognition (discrepancies in recognition when based on language).
Errors hidden within the work lead to errors, and at times the viewer feels anxious as if they are suddenly lost, and at other times, with a lightness and brightness that seems to be playing with words, the viewer is lured into a labyrinth of misperceptions.
His works are devices for understanding things that are "not really visible" through the visual world, and contrary to their pop and design-oriented appearance, they seem to be asking us fundamental questions about the proper meanings of "look/see" and "understand/know".
In this exhibition, we will present his new works from his LINE Series.
We hope you will take this opportunity to enjoy his attempt by actually experiencing it through sight.
Artist Statement
LINE Series is a group of works inspired by symbols such as road signs and markings that overflow in cities. Symbols have the role of conveying information. By extracting characteristic colors and patterns from symbols and simply repeating them, the symbols seem to be released from their original role. Even though the symbols that have lost their functions are no longer symbols, but patterns, we sense signals that shouldn't exist from the mere collection of colors and patterns. A strange feeling hits me as if we were being instructed to do something. Were we the ones being held captive? As I create patterns for signs and markings in my daily work, I am made to think about how vague human cognition is and how there are biases in how individuals perceive the world.
This exhibition will feature new works from the LINE Series. The new pieces have almost no color or pattern. When things that were supposed to be symbols lose their characteristics and return to the state of things themselves, when they are no longer objects of recognition and return to just being there, I wanted to see what was still visible even when there was nothing left to see. Something that becomes invisible as soon as I try to focus on seeing it. What emerges from the work, which is freed from being seen, is the ambiguity of the world of cognition, as if one's own line of sight passes through the work, circles the globe, and then returns from behind.
The cognitive boundaries between “you” and “me” will always be shaken, and the uncertainty will be accentuated by the gaze of the inner other. I hope you enjoy the small errors caused by the new work along with the old work.
Keita Sakai
Biography
Keita Sakai
1997 Born in Tokyo
2021 MA Fine Art in Sculpture at Musashino Art University
Using the perceptual characteristics caused by dyslexia ー reading and writing difficulties ー as a starting point, he creates sculptures with the theme of “gap in recognition” related to literacy. He incorporates trivial everyday actions into his works and conducts his activities while considering the ambiguity of recognition, which means human error.
Awards
2023 Watowa Art Award 2023 Winner of the Second Grand Prix and Jury Prize of Kengo Kito
Kobe Art Marché 2023, Finalist
2022 Watowa Art Award 2022, Finalist
2021 The 15th Gunma Biennale for Young Artists, Finalist
2020 Kuma Foundation Creators’ Scholarship, 4th scholarship student
2019 Contemporary Art Foundation Award, Winner of Grand Prize
Solo exhibitions
2023 Sequence, AOYAMA NOWLOADING, Tokyo, Japan
2022 PLAY-Patapata Nurinuri, A.R.C, Guangzhou, China
2021 COLORS, L'amour Art Space, Hangzhou, China
codecode, KITTE marunouchi 4/Floor, Tokyo, Japan
2020 Underline-Symbols in our everyday lives, Shibuya Hikarie8, CUB＋COURT, Tokyo, Japan
msb gallery is pleased to present “Record at the water border”, a solo exhibition by Ayami Nakashima.
Her unique world depicting detailed and precise expression which reminds us a mysterious nature beings using mineral pigments.
Something like letting us into dream and reality, we can have feeling bringing back to each own ancient memories.
In this exhibition, we will present her new works that depict a phenomenon found in her daily life through the interaction between consciousness and unconsciousness.
We hope you will take this opportunity to enjoy her poetic vision.
Artist Statement
I saw a petal of morning glory reached over to the edge of a small bay.
Holding it in a thin cloth, its color appears and penetrated.
While I thought hearing thunder of somedays, I rose my face up and found some random pieces of drifted objects from here to there.
I can see fishermen over there silhouetted in the light of sunset.
A black kite draws circle silently flying through with wind.
I just draw things come out from this unconscious border,
which can never reach you.
I’m a part of consciousness floating at the water's edge, which cannot find anywhere to go.
Ayami Nakashima
msb gallery is pleased to present “white paper -weißes papier-”, a solo exhibition by kopfkino, Ayano Igarashi.
kopfkino creates imaginary plant specimens by combining a piece of white paper with natural objects. She gives them shape taking the formative beauty of beautiful plants and colors them picking up color each color from natural objects.
In this exhibition, her first solo exhibition, she will present works that use white minerals, fossils, etc., and use minimal coloring, focusing on the "white paper" as a starting point.
We hope that viewers will enjoy coloring the work with their own imaginations, as well as the unique narrative that dwells in "white," which does not seem to belong anywhere and is always dependent on what is next to it.
*The artist is schedule to be in the gallery as below:
1.25 Thu. 12:00-16:00
1.27 Sat. 13:00-16:00
1.31 Wed. 12:00-16:00
2.3 Sat. 12:00-16:00
2.4 Sun. 13:00-17:00
Selected group exhibitions
2023 “What if museum exhibition” usaginonedoko, Kyoto, Japan
“Jeweler's caravan” Chiroptére store, Osaka, Japan
“Night Museum” Guignol, Osaka, Japan
“How to enjoy the rainy day” ranbu, Osaka, Japan
“SICF” Spiral Hall, Tokyo, Japan
2022 Tombo Pencil×minne FAN ART STUDIO, illustrated in May and June
2017 “touch” SMART SHIP GALLERY, Tokyo, Japan
Artist statement
Nowadays due to time passes blinkly speedy in our modern life, it seems like our imaginations are all about what is necessary in our lives.
Only one thing what I want the viewers get from my work is to enjoy “fantasy”.
Kopfkino literally translates to "cinema in your head" in German.
In other words, it means "fantasy”.
When we face with the beauty of nature, our imagination become overflow.
While the story that grows in our head blurs the line between reality and fantasy, it will secretly lead us to an unknown world.
By embodying our fantasies, we can grasp them as something that exists right now.
And also, someone else can imagine the sequel.
This exhibition will focus on “White".
"White" with a lot of blank space can be colored more freely and realistically.
I hope you enjoy the imagination born from a “White paper=blank slate".
Ayano Igarashi