Live Painting by Ayako Rokkaku at Art Fair Tokyo 2009 - Gallery Delaive

AMSTERDAM - “…I want to keep drawing for as long as possible”

At the opening and the weekend of the Art Fair Tokyo 2009, Ayako Rokkaku will perform a live painting session on a 2.20 x 7.00 metres canvas.

The artist Ayako Rokkaku (1982) made this statement in an interview at the Geisai art market in 2006 where she participated with here own stand. Kaikai Kiki, the company of the renowned Japanese pop artist Takashi Murakami launched the Geisai art market to support cutting edge upcoming Japanese artists. Rokkaku has won the Scout Prize at Geisai # 4 and the prestigious Akio Goto Prize at Geisai # 9. Geisai invited high profile industry experts such as Francois Pinault, owner of auction house Christie’s, and the architect Tadao Ando who both took part of the panel of judges for the ninth edition of the art market. Artist Yoshimoto Nara and David Ellis formed a jury panel in earlier editions of Geisai.

Ayako Rokkaku lives in Chiba-ken, a town situated in the ‘greater Tokyo’ area. Rokkaku never attended art school; here technique is self-taught. She started to paint in 2002 and has exhibited at many art fairs in Japan. About these participations at fairs and other events in her daily life Rokkaku keeps a web log. Keeping such a dairy on the internet gives the viewer the unique opportunity to peek inside the private ‘girly’ mind of a young Japanese artist; Rokkaku’s favourite food are chocolate chip cookies, her favourite occupation is day dreaming.

Rokkaku has mastered her own painting technique. She applies the acrylic paint on the cardboard sheets and canvas with here bare hands. The adolescent children, the main subject in her work, are mostly illustrated from close-up. The long arms and big eyes are made in the style of Japanese Anime (Japanese for animation), which is emphasized by the use of bright colours and simple details. Rokkaku does not place the children in front of an architectural background; here subjects seem to live in a fantasy landscape. The painterly figures made in thick acrylic paint are portrayed in various poses; sitting, running, lying. It is this innocent portrait of dynamic refrained from architectural details that form the essence of Rokkaku’s work.

The power of her direct approach to the canvas is optimal manifested in her ‘performance paintings’ which she creates live at art fairs, as an audience of such a happening we get the chance to be part of her world.

Since here debut show in 2007 at Gallery Delaive in Amsterdam Rokkaku has attracted the attention of many international art collectors and had numerous shows in international galleries and at art fairs. Rokkaku has travelled around the world to witness the excited and happy reaction from the visitors on her work with here own eyes, an excitement which she thinks is the biggest compliment to her as an artist. In March 2009, Gallery Delaive sold 15 of her paintings at TEFAF Maastricht, the world’s leading art and antiques fair.

Source: Gallery Delaive

For more information please contact Nico Delaive from Gallery Delaive. Tel: +31-20-6221295 or info at delaive.com