How far can painting extend?
For Yutaka Aoki, painting is not confined to canvas and pigment alone. By incorporating light, time, and the surrounding environment into his work, he continually questions the very boundaries of the medium. His reflective surfaces respond to shifting light and changing viewpoints, creating an ever-evolving relationship between the artwork, its viewers, and the space it inhabits.
In recent years, Aoki has deepened his exploration of the canvas support and the process of painting itself—not folding painting further into two dimensions, but reopening it into space. At the heart of this practice lies a simple yet profound question: Where can painting connect?
We spoke with Yutaka Aoki about his evolving practice and the current state of painting, as he prepares to present his work at Tokyo Gendai.
For readers encountering your work for the first time, could you tell us about your artistic practice?
My practice centers on painting while expanding into sculptural forms. I am particularly interested in the relationship between painting and dimensionality.
By treating light as a medium, much like paint itself, the surface of the work takes on a mirror-like quality. Through this approach, the work responds to its surrounding environment and the passage of time, allowing it to continually change.
Your works often reveal the reverse side of the canvas or allow the stretcher itself to merge into the surrounding space, giving the impression that you are deconstructing the structure of painting. Where does this exploration of expanding the boundaries of painting come from?
I want to know where painting can connect.
If we consider the current state of painting to be something continually folded into two dimensions, then I want to unfold it once again.
My practice feels like taking inventory—carefully examining where painting connects with adjacent boundaries, and where those boundaries separate.
Beyond the physical materials of canvas and paint, light and the changing experience of viewing also seem central to your work. When creating these shifting spatial experiences, what kinds of moments inspire you most?
I respond to the sense of movement that exists within an undifferentiated state—something that cannot be fixed or fully defined.
It is a condition where different forces remain in delicate balance.
At times, that balance evokes a sense of awe.
Have your recent exhibitions led to any new developments in your practice or in the way you engage with your materials, such as acrylic, canvas, and supports?
What has changed is the unit of the work—not its physical size, but its content.
Within the picture plane, there must be a tension between my own gestures and the phenomena that emerge through the process.
For each work, I adjust the layering of the ground and the mixing ratios of the paint, searching for the methods most appropriate to what each piece requires.
Through this process, my approach has gradually crystallized, and I have developed techniques that are only possible because of the properties of acrylic resin.
I use spray paint as a metaphor for light, and by establishing a more refined technical structure, the phenomena that unfold across the surface have changed dramatically.
Many different conditions now coexist within the picture plane.
Tokyo Gendai is an international art fair where diverse people and perspectives intersect. What are your hopes for audiences visiting the fair and for Japan’s contemporary art scene?
Pacifico Yokohama, where Tokyo Gendai takes place, is located in the Minato Mirai waterfront district—a place with a rich history of important artistic practices.
I hope visitors will encounter a wide range of ideas at the fair and experience art as something to be read.
Afterwards, I encourage them to walk through the surrounding area once again.
I believe they may discover something entirely new.
Thank you very much! We look forward to seeing your work in September.
Beyond Light. Experience Yutaka Aoki’s Paintings at Tokyo Gendai.
Dates:
11-13 September 2026 (Fri-Sun) *Vernissage: 10 September (Thu)
Venue:
Pacifico Yokohama
Booth:
KOSAKU KANECHIKA
Ticket Purchase:
Yutaka Aoki
Yutaka Aoki was born in Kumamoto Prefecture, Japan, in 1985, and is currently based in Tokyo. In 2008, he graduated from Tokyo Zokei University’s Department of Fine Arts, and received a Master of Fine Arts from the same institution in 2010. Aoki expands the scope of painting through an examination of the relationship between painting and the surrounding world, and of the many possibilities that are born from that exchange. Employing multiple techniques, Aoki’s gaze is always on the study of light and its three-dimensional quality. Supplemented by transformations engendered by specific elements in the environment, including the passage of time, the presence of an audience, and the nature of the exhibition space, light imbues his work with an organic richness.
He has presented major solo exhibitions which include “multiprime” (hiromiyoshii, Tokyo, 2011), “OUTER ROOM, INNER GARDEN” (Contemporary Art Museum, Kumamoto, 2012), and “Mouvements” (Sprout Curation, Tokyo, 2014). Notable group exhibitions include “The Way of Painting” (Tokyo Opera City Art Gallery, 2014), “CHOKOKU: Modern Japanese Sculpture from its Beginning to 1980’s, Works from the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo” (Contemporary Art Museum, Kumamoto, 2019), and “A Personal View of Japanese Contemporary Art: Takahashi Ryutaro Collection” (Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, 2024). His works have been acquired by the Contemporary Art Museum, Kumamoto, and the Takahashi Ryutaro Collection.
