YOHEI IMAMURA

Artist bio

peak 3601
November 9 - 24, 2019
Opening reception: Saturday, November 9, 6-8pm

Yohei Imamura's new work "peak 3601" finally came back to Tokyo from Aichi Triennale.
Please come and visit the gallery to enjoy the show. Limited time only, so please do not miss!

Since his student days, Yohei Imamura has consistently created print art that can be associated with sculpture through the action of layering resinous oil ink hundreds and thousands of times, by employing manual duplication technology in silkscreen printing. By use of the screen which is created through filling the mesh openings with special emulsion by drawing directly on the screen, he produces complex geometric patterns or forms suggestive of mountain ranges.

For this new work “peak 3601”, Imamura started to work on this project from the end of 2016 to July 2019, it took the artist two and a half years to complete and it has become the largest piece of his works. The number “3601” is the number of the ink layers, i.e. how many times the artist screen printed. Imamura’s breakthrough innovation and a number of “trial and error” are apparent in the works such as “log, peak”, “turn, peak”, “composition,　peak” which show the records of art making process.

“log, peak”
This painting shows what kind of oils, colors were used and numbers of layers were silk-screened to produce the main piece “peak 3601”. Imamura says that it is possible to reproduce the work with this painting. The colors of the letters written with color pencils were chosen randomly by the artist through two and a half years of his artmaking. In the middle of production, the canvas was extended and Imamura continued to work on the sides. On the right side we can see the last number “3601.”

“turn, peak”
These 88 printed works are a collection of prints of 120 silk screen patterns that were used to produce the main piece. You will find pieces with only 1 pattern as well as the ones with 2 patterns. The artist decided to do so to achieve the best balance he desired on each sheet. The number stated on the sheet shows us which layer that pattern is used. By collating the number written on the edge of each sheet with the work “log, peak”, we can understand where each pattern and color is located in the final state of the main piece.

“composition, peak”
The main piece “peak 3601” is based on this drawing. The arrangement and number of patterns of the main piece were determined in accordance with this drawing. Imamura used 120 acrylic colors which is same as the number of patterns used to produce the main piece.

Yohei Imamura was born in 1979 in Fukuoka, Japan.
Recently, Imamura presented his work in "Aichi Triennale 2019 -Taming Y/Our Passion" at Aichi, 2019, "The universe consists of dots and lines" at Fujisawa City Art Space, Kanagawa, 2019, "live printing" at KAYOKOYUKI, Tokyo, 2016, "CSP2" at Kuwasawa Design School, Tokyo, 2014, ”Marsupials" curated by Taro Izumi at TALION GALLERY, Tokyo, 2012, "camaboco” at Tokyo Zokei University, Tokyo, 2010, ”Draw print book” at esplanade, Singapore, 2008.
Lives and works in Kanagawa.