KEIICHI TANAAMI

Japanese artist Keiichi Tanaami explores canvases and sculptural pieces to create his surreal artworks.

A collection of different motifs associated with his childhood experience of war, glowing, grotesque creatures that personify bombs and the light of their explosions. Beams of light represents Japanese troops keeping watch for American bomber planes. The skeletal monsters embody war casualties, and at the same time function as figures of us, ourselves, who know no fear.

“A recurring character based on a motif that comes from Tanaami’s wartime memory of goldfish also frequently appears in his works, and is deeply connected to the sight of the light from the American bombs reflecting off of the scales of the goldfish his grandfather kept. Pine trees, seemingly pregnant with animal-like life forms, are based on hallucinations Tanaami witnessed when he nearly died from a pulmonary edema at age 44.”

 

All Rights Reserved to Keiichi Tanaami

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