Artists | NEW YORK & JAPAN
“I (now)…see ordinary people on streets, people whom I hadn’t paid attention (to), in a different way, with more intimate feeling.”
Taku Saito
Taku Saito is a New York-based artist, born in Japan. Saito’s recent paintings are series of his self-portrait. With over-sized, expressionless faces looking straight on, the paintings are all completed in the same composition, size and lighting. Only the brush strokes are different: In the paintings, each single dynamic brush stroke has significant meaning for the face. Dripping oil colors on the canvas represents the theories in nature and gravity, paralleling the chaos in life and the natural world: People are prone to chaos but organize their lives for survival.
Saito’s paintings are created in his small home/studio. He says “Making art in my room is an obstacle, but it is a good challenge - it expands my artistic capability.” In such a tiny workplace, lit by one regular light bulb, Saito uses only simple tools; a big brush, a couple of oil colors, a small hand-held mirror. He is dedicated to expanding his art using these simple materials.
Saito’s artistic motivation is death. Everyone has to face more death as life goes on. When he was a child, he saw his grandfather’s death, but he was not sure what it meant to his family, his friends and others. Then, when he was 18 years old, his mother died from cancer, a jarring example of seeing her full of life one day and dead the next. After spending a few nights with her lifeless body, as is the Japanese funeral tradition, Saito felt that death was more physical than he had previously thought.
After spending a few nights with her lifeless body, Saito felt that death was more physical than he had previously thought.
People are prone to chaos but organize their lives for survival.
At 25 years old, Saito’s friend committed suicide by jumping in front of a running train. On the morning of the accident, Saito saw on the news that trains were delayed because of an accident. It was a full day before Saito connected the morning news to his friend’s suicide, realizing in that moment of connectivity that death is always along with us, always a part of our lives. Saito says, “I don’t think my experience is unusual. I think this is typical life but just people don’t mention it. Those events and my thoughts almost naturally lead me to see ordinary people on streets, people whom I hadn’t paid attention (to), in a different way, with more intimate feeling. I started drawing and painting ordinary people including myself.”
The faces in Saito’s paintings look straight ahead at you with no particular expression. He strips away emotion and superficial incident in order to expose more about the human condition. He condenses such emotionlessness to extract the essence of the face or figure, which is weathered by his - our – life, to show that which is more fundamentally real, that which will transcend life and death. It is a journey to the abyss of the mind.
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