GR gallery is pleased to present Reveal, Naritaka Satoh first solo exhibition in the U.S. and with the gallery. Spreading around the whole gallery space, the show will present fourteen artworks executed with the artist signature technique combining acrylic and pencil on wood panel. Appositely conceived for the event, this new body of works expands Satoh’s visual vocabulary with enhanced subjects, colors and expressions and deepen his discourse on the introspection and duality of the human psyche and the complexity of the hidden symbolism. His highly unique style Juxtaposes hyper realistic, perfectly balanced and controlled, black and white details, with howling and instinctive abstract-expressionist like thick acrylic brushstrokes.
Naritaka Satoh’s artworks, imbued with enigmatic recollections, depict and resolve the contrast in between logic and emotion, pervasive in every solitary and social conduct. Summoning idealistic and traditional tenacious poetic imaginaries, mixing it together with bold factual reality, Satoh creates profound yet captivating compositions, independent from strict anatomy and volume, encapsuled in an uncertain time interval. The title takes inspiration from and old Japanese saying: 'Cover up what smells bad'. Quoting the artist words: ‘As the saying goes, to be pleased or displeased only with the good parts that have been released into the world, without revealing inconvenient truths, is like wandering through a fictional world. Things are made up of all kinds of intertwining and balancing events, including those that are favorable or unacceptable to oneself. We struggle, waver and wriggle between the boundaries of all kinds of circumstances. The process is never visible to the human eye, but I believe that by understanding the whole picture, with all the elements of the background that go on inside the beautifully prepared membrane, we can live in the reality without any falsehoods’.
Eros and Thanatos, order and anarchy, harmony and instability, consciousness and unconsciousness inevitably live together in any entity and the importance of finding a balance in between these forces is what generates exceptional minds and creations. Satoh’s made his priority to give a shape to this resolved disconnection, masterfully depicting the solemnity of this splendid and serene spirit able to give the right space and to keep under control the chaos that inhabit it.
Naritaka Satoh (Aichi Prefecture, 1980), graduated from Tokyo University of the Arts in 2006 and obtained an MFA in Design at the same University in 2008. Since then he has been working on developing the exclusive style that we can admire today. His paintings are mostly focused on portraits and still life subjects that result in a fusion of drawings so detailed that could be mistaken for photographs, with a layered of acrylic abstract matière. His works, which have a strong presence created by his solid skills, have been attracting attention and support from both inside and outside Japan and have been exhibited extensively in Asia mostly and became part of prestigious art collections all over the world.
