Untitled 無題

Born in the Kanagawa prefecture and having studied oil painting at Tokyo University of the Arts, NAKAZONO Koji (1989-2015) had attracted much attention since his student days as a young and up-and-coming artist known for his uninhibited and diverse style of work. By the time he passed away at the age of 25 due to an unexpected accident, Nakazono had created over 500 works as a culmination of his rich creativity and remarkable techniques. Each permeating with a distinct personality and an overwhelming presence, his works are highly prolific to the extent that they do not appear as if having been created by the same artist. While they seem to have been depicted with dynamic brushstrokes with vigorous momentum, he selects his use of materials such as crayon and oil paint according to the work, at times adding scratches or making changes to the texture by squeezing paint directly from the tube and painting with his fingers, thereby bringing a multilayered sense of depth to the flat surface of the picture plane. As if to confirm the artist’s own words in which he had stated, “I am basically unable to explain what this painting is about,” many of Nakazono’s works are in fact untitled. In tow with this point, his works convey a certain air of inauspiciousness amidst worlds of uncanny fantasy, thus strongly attracting viewers and encouraging their imagination in various ways. Untitled, produced in 2015, is a work that had been left in his studio at the time of his passing. It was only in this year that Nakazono had relocated his home and studio to Takamatsu City in the Kagawa Prefecture. The young man, who walks along a straight path as if being invited by the human-shaped cloud that hangs in the sky like a divine revelation, appears to symbolize the artist himself, zealously engaging in his practice amidst the bright sunshine that illuminates the Seto Inland Sea.