Ryotaro Endo “Paint / ing”

Base Gallery is pleased to present “Paint / ing,” a solo exhibition of new works by Ryotaro Endo. This is his fourth
exhibition at the gallery.

In the past works, Endo has started with drawing pictures in his computer and had them printed out on canvas.
He fundamentally adheres to the same working process in the new works for this exhibition.
Likewise, the expression with profound skepsis and critique toward art over periods of hundreds of years laid behind as
an undercurrent stays constant.
A great number of paintings have been made over a long period of time. Since music as well as language have been used over and over,
it is rare to contact something that truly comes down to our heart.
The means of expression have been institutionalized, and the only something unsettling comes and goes.
Therefore the frameworks of traditional paintings are applied as the composition, and he paints in with strokes afterward.
Endo’s paintings induce slight bewilderment along with deja vu the frameworks originally have.
The title of the exhibition “Paint / ing” is derived from the background like this.
However, when compared to past works, the new works for this exhibition adopt further multilayered compositions and make us feel the depth and perspective as if making inroads into.
Endo uses mirror as the support medium for the first time. On the mirror is someone’s face screen-printed,
and the image drawn in his computer is not based on the referenced compositions.
The mirror with wavering and intricate facial outlines reflects all who see it and takes the wraps off the
uncertainness of our self-existence.

Not to mention the work on canvas, the mirror work once again raise the question of not only expression
itself, but also dubiety and skepsis of our very beings who sees them.

-Artist statement-