Posts Tagged ‘Tokyo’

Feb
20
'10

Karikakoi

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Tokyo Metropolis is the capital and largest city of Japan. The total population of the prefecture exceeds 12 million, and an average life span of a building in Tokyo is around 17 years. With this figure, it shows that this city has redevelopment constantly. As such, construction sites are everywhere, and the walls surrounding them, called karikakoi, are often white, invading the urban landscape with long and giant blanks.

However, there have been several efforts to avoid such sore sights by some development projects by using them as canvases for artful illustrations and paintings.

The following are some images of such graffiti.

Construction Fense

Construction Fense

Karikakoi

Karikakoi

Karikakoi

Karikakoi

Karikakoi Painters

Karikakoi Painters

PingMag has more examples of creative uses of these spaces in Tokyo.

Feb
07
'10

artless Inc AKA Shun Kawakami (Japan)

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artless Inc is a multi-award design agency cum art studio that started out back in the year 2000. It is co-founded by Shun Kawakami, and is based in Tokyo, Japan. Not limited to only art, this studio also does music label named artless records.

artless Inc work scope includes brand and corporate identity strategy, packaging, advertising, web design, interior and architecture, and also installation.

artless AKA Shun Kawakami

artless AKA Shun Kawakami

Shun Kawakami is born in Tokyo, 1977. He is an artist slash designer, which co-founded artless Inc. He is active in various visual communication fields, involving arts and design, prints, web, video and installation.

Check out one of his collaborative projects, balloon as vase here. The vases were originally created for “composition of knowledge and feeling,” an exhibition with Takashi Kawada that was shown at JAGDA TOKYO last month.

Balloon as vase 02

Balloon as vase 02

Related links:

http://shunkawakami.jp/
http://www.artless.co.jp/
http://www.nullartless.com/
http://www.artlessrecords.com/

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Feb
06
'10

Ryu Itadani (Japan)

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Tokyo / H: 42.0cm W: 178.7cm / 2006 / Inkjet Print on Paper

Tokyo / H: 42.0cm W: 178.7cm / 2006 / Inkjet Print on Paper

Ryu Itadani is born in 1974 in Osaka, Japan. Since then, he has been living in Osaka, Toronto, and London and since 2004; he has been living and working in Tokyo. He graduated from Central St. Martins College of Art and Design with Degree in Graphic Design.

He has a very unique point of view towards his surrounding especially city, inanimate objects and nature, which contributed mainly into his works’ theme. He plays with hand-drawn lines and lots of colours in creating his artworks. The end result produces a very simple, naive yet detailed drawing with bright colours to bombard the viewer.

“I see the things, then I see the lines, then I see the colors,” he says. “In terms of creation, I try my upmost. Enjoyment is important to me. Communication is the key thing.”

J-WAVE / H: 50.4cm W: 42.0cm / 2008 / Inkjet Print on Paper

J-WAVE / H: 50.4cm W: 42.0cm / 2008 / Inkjet Print on Paper

His media are just as simple. He uses black pen to draw lines on a white piece of paper, proceed to scan the drawing, and input colours using computer software. Lately, he has started using acrylic painting as well.

His style of drawing can be found in various fashion labels, magazines, newspapers and advertisements. Recently, Itadani has worked with OMOTESANDO HILLS and Asahi Newspaper.

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Jan
18
'10

Tokyo Nobody by Masataka Nakano

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Tokyo Nobody

Tokyo Nobody

Tokyo is a metropolis of over 12 million populations. With such crowded place, how does one imagine it to be empty without any human being? Masataka Nakano seemed to be able to do just the impossible. Not only was he able to imagine so, he even captured the whole city (well, almost) through his camera lense into his masterpiece, a 96-paged photo book, namely Tokyo Nobody.

How did he do so? All he needed is going out venturing into the city at the oddest hours of the day and waiting for the right opportunity to capture a single shot of Tokyo totally deserted. And he took 11 years to do so.

As commented in Multilink Magazine, “For 11 years, photographer Masataka Nakano has kept watch for the most impossible of scenes: central Tokyo street scenes inhabited by nobody. These aren’t manipulated composites but rather the result of a dedicated opportunist. There’s something very eerie about these desolate moments and their startling absence of congestion, usually so integral to the portrayal of this environment.”

The photobook is not new. It has been released back in September 2007. For those who are interested to get a glimpse of the images check out Masataka-san’s gallery at Art Unlimited.