Kyoto, JAPAN
Akitoshi Matsuhara
Photograph＆Computer Graphics / Giclee+和紙 ( Washi )
Akitoshi Matsuhara is a contemporary artist from Japan. He has exhibited in various solo and group exhibitions, nationally and internationally, and been presented numerous prizes and awards.
My work is trying to create an image beyond the ability of a camera to capture, and beyond the limits of the human eye to see. An audience looking at the work should feel that it's a scene they have never seen before.
— What are your most brave art ambitions?
— Tour large-scale solo exhibitions in cultural cities around the world.
— When new people ask what kind of art do you do – what do you answer?
— "NATURE and BEYOND", "Light, Flowing Out" (names of his big art projects).

— What is your daily art routine?
— I don't have anything special, but listen to music that matches the image of the work.

— What inspires you for work and what experience of your life would you say that is reflected in your works of art?
— "NATURE and BEYOND", "Light, Flowing Out".

A hybrid of science, spirituality and wonder
— What do you see as the strengths of your pieces, visually or conceptually?
— It is strongly transmitted to the sensibility of the viewer.

— What was your most strange art experiment?
— Alphonse Mucha Slav Epic.

— What is the most difficult in a work of artist?
— Production cost.

— What obstacles do you face in making and exhibiting your work?
— Production cost.

— What is the future for art? What will be art in 22 century?
— My art.

— What is the reason (and meaning) for your use of reflections and repetition of elements of nature?
— There are many living creatures on the Earth and, in appearance, lifeforms and organisms which consciously move have a left-right symmetrical form. From this idea, I think if a natural landscape appears symmetrical, one can feel a sense of life there. In other words, nature can be animate (assuming that there may be lifeforms existing somewhere in the universe with no gravity, perhaps they don't have this left-right symmetry).

Life has long existed within nature. In fact before about 800 AD, when Buddhism was first introduced to Japan from the continent, the Shinto worship of nature was practised. People honoured various elements of nature as gods, such as mountains, waterfalls, stones and large trees.
— Do you want viewers to feel a specific feeling?
— I want them to feel free. As humans (or organisms) we try to determine meaning from visual information. From things like texture and silhouette, we find an answer by searching for similarities within the data of our past experience. For example, we see a kettle used in a tea ceremony – Japanese people associate it with the image of a teahouse and the fragrance of tea, and know it is a tool used to boil water. But if a foreigner who doesn't know the tea ceremony sees it, they won't understand that it's a kettle.

Read more here
Solo exhibitions in 2021
May 15-23 Moriyama Citizen's Hall. Shiga Prefecture Japan
June 16-21 Kiyomizudera Jojuin. Kyoto Japan