Top (L-R): Kei’ichiro Matsuda, Artist (Name not known), Artist (Name not known), Miyuki Ishizaki, Michelle Zacharias, Masako Otani.

Back (L-R): Takashi Yokoyama, Midori Takahashi, Yayoi Kobayashi, Yumiko Nohara, Kaoru Tatikame, Miyako Araki

Group shows can be lots of fun when the artists are such nice people! On the last day, many people were coming and going, so I was unable to get all the names of  all the artists. If I am lucky, some people will tell me later. As it is, Masako Otani helped me by calling some people over to get their photos taken. Thank you! Some people came earlier in the week when I had not yet thought of taking photos of the artists with their artwork. Sorry! I did take a few the other day though…

Hirotaka Moriya visited the gallery earlier in the week. His calligraphic (shodo) pieces are as interesting as he is. His work might be regarded as outsider art, because he is on the autism spectrum. Before I knew that, however, I liked his paintings and thought some were pictures of bamboo forests. He also goes to English class and seemed happy to say, “Bye-bye”. He knew what it meant and when it was appropriate to say.

Do you know what the subject of this drawing is? I thought it was bamboo, but I was wrong. The left shows the days of the week in his schedule; the right shows names of places if I recall correctly but I might be wrong. I love this piece. His parents, and probably him as well, were very happy when they heard that some of his pieces had been sold.

Kei’ichiro Matsuda used a silkscreening technique that uses torn or cut paper. If you look at the top print of the woman’s face in black and white, doesn’t it remind you of paper cuttings? The colourful ones are monoprints in a series, because the positioning of the colour elements has not been standardized. Yes, this is still a limited edition.

I have a lot of printmaking friends and I thought they might appreciate the close-ups of the silkscreen prints.

Don’t you love Matsuda’s shoes? Can you believe that he used to work in an office every day?

Miyazo, also known as Miyako Araki, did the cat masks behind her. Can you see the one with all the black? That is based on a traditional Japanese design that you often see in traditional crafts. I always thought it was a dog until similar images popped up everywhere in the Year of the Cat. (Capitalisation is intentional.) These masks were ¥2000, and the white ones were ¥1500. She was very happy when she heard that everything had sold out!

Artists can be so silly, can’t they? Miyazo  and I were just hamming around being silly.

This smiling cat is a papier-mache lamp shade. It is even marked with the Chinese character for good luck.

I finally got a picture of Masako Otani! She only had one of her paper vases with flowers left; all of the others sold. Congratulations!

All of the artists were selling pieces for very affordable prices. It is proof that you do not need to spend lots of money for reproductions when you can get original art for much less. Buy it because you like it. You do not need any other reason.