Towa Takaya
Artist, painter
Born in 1992, Tokyo. Currently based in Tokyo. Moved to London in 2011 and studied art and design in Central Saint Martins school of Art. Graduated from Goldsmiths, University of Arts London with a bachelor’s degree in Art in 2016. Her paintings whose uniqueness appears by elegant lines and mystic colors are rooted in trans-disciplinary thoughts from spatial to time and existence. Takaya has been focusing on painting as well as exporting digital medium including filming and Virtual Reality. She expands her art practice to other creative fields, cooperating as art supervision for filmmaking and other commercial works. She participated in group exhibitions: ART FAIR TOKYO 2019 at Tokyo International Forum: Smile of Flowers in 2018, Kobayashi Gallery, Tokyo: Adobe Max Japan 2017 at PACIFICO YOKOHAMA: TSUNAGARI Project at National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation, Tokyo: Enter in 2016 at exhibition room of Daigaku Kaikan, University of the Arts, Tokyo: ON the THRESHOLD II : Formal Presence in 2016 at Oriental museum in Durham, UK.
Artist statement
Since my nomination to the 83rd KOKUTEN at the National Art Centre in Tokyo in 2009, I have explored my own painterly way; proposing as paintings the origin of space where we cannot speak.
I create with my paintings, whichever abstract or figurative, a space in which physicality and relation between materials are presented in a different way from the world they usually belong to.
In my art practice, there is no subject matter presented but appearance of objects in the painting displays the presence, or being, before it functions as symbol or sign to generate certain narratives. The space created is often flat, both in terms of semiology and perspective. There is no division between past, present and future. The works point out the place where language doesn't start to generate meaning but have presence.
Introducing the artist
Towa Takaya creates with her paintings, whichever abstract or figurative, a space in which physicality and relation between materials are presented (not represented) in a different way from the world they usually belong to.
This space does not have its own meaning. Neither has it depth. In other words, the space she creates is flat, both in terms of semiology and perspective. Besides, neither has it the flow of time; there is no division between past, present and future. Concerning time sequence, the space the painting proposes is also flat.
It does not mean that the space of Towa’s works generates no meanings. Rather, the space creates a flat space in which beholder and the work encounter, and at that time the meaning emerges. In other words, her works have a potential to generate a phenomenological encounter, so that it generates rather than has meanings. That is, only if the space of her works is in contact with the beholders who perceive the world with the sense of time-flow, meaning and story about the works begin to appear.
In this sense, the space which her paintings generate seems to be “the space of appearance,” in H. Arendt’s terminology. She claims that in the space of appearance
[t]o be alive means to live in a world that preceded one’s own arrival and will survive one’s own departure. On this level of sheer being alive, appearance and disappearance, as they follow upon each other, are the primordial events, which as such mark out time, the time span between birth and death. (H. Arendt, The Life of the Mind)
Towa’s paintings require to be experienced in a space which enables layered spaces to coexist. At the primordial level of experience, the painting is flat, because it is not linked with meaning, space, and time of the “world that preceded one’s own arrival”. However, her painting activates the world at the moment of phenomenological encounter in the space of appearance where appearance of disappearance and disappearance of appearance make sense at once. For instance, while the visual, or substantial, appearance of objects and body on canvas emerges as the disappearance of their usual form, the appearance of the original form of them (in the Aristotelian sense) is proposed as the disappearance of their forms which are con-figured visually and materially. Here, flatness of painting itself and layers of spaces it creates coexist, as it presents appearance with disappearance.
The reason Towa’s works function as such is that they create, or themselves are, the space of appearance, which is flat and simultaneously layered in terms of meaning, time and space. In this way, Towa proposes as paintings the origin of space which enables the phenomenological encounter.
Junya Utsumi
EDUCATION
Center for Special Information Science in The University of Tokyo
Cooperative Research Fellow Jan, 2017- 2019
Goldsmith College, University of London
BA (Hons), Fine Art 2012-2015
Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design , University of Arts London
Foundation Diploma for Art and Design 2011– 2012
Keio University (Japan)
BA, Economics 2010– 2011
CV
SOLO EXHIBITION
UNTITLDIES
Date: 16th Jan to 2nd Feb in 2020
Venue: why not ? yuutenji, tokyo (Tokyo, Japan)
Plastic Rendez-vous
Venue: 5th base gallery (London, England) 2014
Either me or you
Sponsored by Jun Atsushi & Kaoru Ichikawa Fine Art
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Venue: DESIGN FESTA GALLERY EAST 302 (Tokyo, Japan) 2014
The One
Jun Atsushi & Kaoru Ichikawa Fine Art (Mie, Japan ) 2013
GROUP EXHIBITION
Things may or may not be useful but beautiful
Date; 1st Feb to 11th Feb in 2020
Venue: Monkey Galley DAIKANYAMA
Official website: http://monkeycafe.jp/
How Tokyo Biennale ?
Date; 14th Oct to 4th Nov in 2019
Venue: 3331 Arts Chiyoda
Adress: 6-11-14, Higashikanda,Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo, JAPAN
Official website https://tokyobiennale.jp/2019pre-event/venue1/
Arcus Pride Art Exhibition
Date: 28th Jun to 10th March, 2019
Venue: JP Morgan Tokyo brunch
Adress: Tokyo Building, 7-3, Marunouchi 2-chome, Chiyoda-ku,Tokyo 100-6432
Arcus Pride Art Exhibition
Date: 27th Jun to 10th March, 2019
Venue: Clifford Chance International Law-farm Tokyo
Adress: Tokyo Palace Building, 3rd floor 1-1, Marunouchi 1-chome. Chiyoda-ku. Tokyo 100-0005
Official website: https://www.cliffordchance.com/content/dam/cliffordchance/hub/Arcus2019/Arcus-Pride-Art-Brochure-2019.pdf
ART FAIR TOKYO 2019
Date: 7th March to 10th March, 2019
Venue；Tokyo International Forum / Kobayashi Gallery Exhibition booth
Artist: Izumi Akiyama, Sei Shibusawa, Chihiro Tanaka, Taniho Reina, Rina Yokyama, Takeshi Tanaka, Towa Takaya
Supported by；Art Tokyo Association
Official website：
Smile of Flowers
Venue:Kobayashi Gallery
Adress; 3F, 1-15-13,Shiba, Minato-ku,Tokyo,JAPAN
Sven Fresher Green
Venue; Kobayashi Gallery
Adress:7-5-12, Ginza, Chuo-ku, Ginza, Tokyo, JAPAN
Enter
Date; 6th -9th Dec, 2017
Venue:Tokyo University of the Arts (Exhibition Room, Faculty of Music Campus,)
Adress:12-8 Ueno Park, Taito-ku, TOKYO 110-8714 JAPAN
Participating artists: Jyuri Akiyama, Towa Takaya
Curated by Jyunya Utsumi (Graduate School of Global Arts, Tokyo University of the Arts)
Wework x Creative Debuts
Wework at Devonshire Square (London,UK)
25 April,2016-2019
Oliver Agency x Creative Debutes
Oliver Agency (Shoreditch, London, UK)
19 April,2016 - 2019
ON the THERESHOLD II: Formal Presence
Oriental Museum/ Teikyo University DURHAM (Durham, UK)
29 Jan - 20 May, 2016
https://www.dur.ac.uk/oriental.museum/
ON the THRESHOLD
Oriental Museum/ Teikyo University DURHAM (Durham, UK)
10 -15 Nov, 2015
https://www.dur.ac.uk/oriental.museum/whatson/details/?id=27959
Hoxton Hotel x Creative Debuts
Hoxton Gallery in Hoxton Hotel Holborn (London, UK)
6th Octorber 2015- 6th Janurary 2016
https://hoxtown.com/events/hoxtown-gallery-presents-creative-debuts
GOLDSMITHS, UNIVERSITY of LONDON
Graduates Exhibition curated by VJB Arts,
10 Gresham Street, (London, UK) Sep 2015- Jan 2016
Creative Debuts Showcase VIII (Whitechapel Gallery's First Thursday)
Black and White building (London, UK) 2015
GOLDSMITHS DEGREE SHOW 2015
Goldsmiths, University of London (London, UK) 2015
RAW TALENT 2014
Dalston Department Store (project space) (London, UK) 2014
ART KAMEYAMA 2012
Shiboriya, Kameyama Higashi shopping street (Mie, Japan) 2012
Painting Show
Central Saint Martins College of Art (London, UK) 2012
ART KAMEYAMA in TOKYO
DESIGN FESTA GALLERY (Tokyo, Japan) 2011
Informania
Keio Raiousya Gallery (Kanagawa, Japan) 2010
FILM FESTIVAL
Maebashi Film Festival 2016
Sponsored by Maebashi Film Festival Execution Committee
11th-12th Nov,2016 (Maebashi, Japan)
AWARD
Young Creators Award 2017
MI Gallery
14th-31st Oct, 2017 (Osaka, Japan)
83rd KOKUTEN
THE NATIONAL ART CENTER, TOKYO (Tokyo, Japan) 2009
COLLABORATION
Collaboration with Kuriya Keiko
from "the thirty three forms of antiquity"
Organised by Honoka Natsuyama(from Kuriya Keiko) and Yutaro Ono
Special thanks to Jun Atsushi & Kaoru Ichikawa Fine Art
Kuriya Keiko (London, England) 2015
ARC x TOWA TAKAYA
live performance for VR painting @ NTT docomo Ventures,（Tokyo, Japan）
22nd March, 2017
Operated by ARC
Technical assistance by Nano media
The venue provided by NTT docomo Ventures
SAMPO,Inc x TOWA TAKAYA
live performance (experimentation)
1st May to 5th Oct 2017
Operated by Riku Murakami and Issui Shioura
WORKSHOP
TUNAGARI Project -Picture Happiness on Earth-
Venue; National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation (Miraikan)
Event website: