Acrylic on paper

51 × 72 cm. 20 1/8 × 28 3/8 in.

Titled in English, dated and signed in Japanese on the reverse
PROVENANCE
Mizuma Art Gallery, Tokyo
Private Collection, Asia

Establishing the Possibility of Dialogue with Art
An Early “Self-Intro” of Tomokazu Matsuyama

Tomokazu Matsuyama is a rising art star attracting much attention recently. Different from many other artists with professional backgrounds in art, he decided to become an artist at the age of 25. After receiving a master's degree in communication design from the Pratt Institute, he has lived in New York and has been creating since then. In his creation, he tries to break the boundaries of Eastern and Western cultures, freely quoting Japanese Ukiyo-e, Renaissance paintings, and even post-war abstract expressionism and other diverse visual vocabularies and merging them to create new patterns.

Creating the Unique Vocabulary, Reflecting the Flow of Culture

Although the first glance of his works often grants people with a Superflat visual experience. He likes the texture of the painting so that he still insists on finishing the work by finely coloring layer by layer, sometimes even deliberately splashing, and dripping paint. Such techniques increase the gradual change of the picture, thus reflecting the highly fluid characteristics of global culture.

Runnin completed in 2006, is a clear example of his narrative construction style, in which he continuously crosses the cultural backgrounds and intersperses with different visual vocabularies. In the painting, a stylishly dressed man holds a riding whip in his right hand and rein in his left hand, as if he was riding a horse galloping from outside the painting into the large green space in the painting, chasing the man at the front left. The latter runs on the orange track and looks back at the man on the horse at the same time. The composition of two men is full of peculiar visual tension.

But if looking closely, you will find that with colors, lines, and the slightly different ratios of far and near, he cleverly separates the two characters in different spatial fields; and the reason of the narrative formation and the plot deduction is completely derived from people's viewing inertia. Therefore, by creating a middle ground between understanding and imagination, he not only challenges the existing image cognition, but also stimulates the viewer's possibility of dialogue.

Price estimate:
HKD: 70,000 - 150,000
USD: 9,000 - 19,300

Auction Result:
HKD: 120,000