"The person who depicts the joy of life: Kondo Aki" by Hiroyasu Yamauchi, Reco Reco!

～RECORD of RECOmmendations Recommended Records～

Planning/Writing: Hiroyasu Yamauchi

In this project, writer Hiroyasu Yamauchi has found a number of art and culture books that he thinks are "this is it!" and will recommend them wholeheartedly.

This time , we will be introducing a beautiful and colorful collection of works created by artist Kondo Aki between 2019 and 2020.

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"A person who depicts the joy of life: Kondo Aki "

Why do people draw pictures?

Nowadays, smartphones are great for recording, commemorating, and making notes. Images of loved ones, fun moments, and wonderful scenes can be stored in the memory of each person.

Even in these times, people continue to take the time and effort to draw and look at pictures. Why?

The answer can be found in the person and work of Kondo Aki.

The act of drawing and the act of looking at it are joys in themselves.

He wants to give form to both what can be seen and what cannot be seen, and in that way affirm the world.

"Happiness is Here" (ShugoArts) Exhibition view ©Aki Kondo, courtesy of ShugoArts

When I hold a brush, my blood boils

Aki Kondo began exhibiting her paintings in the early 2010s, and has continued to paint tirelessly ever since.

Born in Sapporo, he loved drawing from an early age and went on to study at Tohoku University of Art and Design. He experienced the Great East Japan Earthquake while in graduate school, and since graduating has produced many paintings with the theme of the disaster.

In 2015, he released the short film "HIKARI," which combined live action and pictorial animation, creating a new form of expression.

The pace at which he produces his works is always astounding. The amount of passion he puts into each piece is incredible. Each stroke is filled with his will and emotion, and you can tell that he is putting all his energy into painting.

"Drawing is a part of everyday life, it's a part of life itself"

That's what he says.

"For me, the act of drawing is something that is completely natural and part of everyday life, like breathing in and out, or plants photosynthesizing and continually converting carbon dioxide into oxygen.

I barely remember anything about the time I was drawing. Rather than thinking about it, I moved my body while feeling something."

Aki Kondo, "The Happiness of Just Being There" ©Aki Kondo, courtesy of ShugoArts

Things I want to draw constantly come to mind.

"I don't just copy the visible world. I try to find images that lie at the root of things.

For example, if I see a flower blooming there and think it's beautiful, instead of painting the petals, I think about the seed from which the plant sprouted. Furthermore, my eyes may turn to the soil that must have given the seed the power to germinate, and I may end up painting only that soil. What I try to paint is always something that is at the root of these things."

Going back to the roots of what makes things what they are, and drawing each picture, over and over again, seems like it would be pretty exhausting.

"When I finish painting a picture, I feel like I'm empty inside. When that happens, I need a period of time to nourish myself, or to take in the elements that will become the basis of the painting. But after a little while, I find myself regaining strength and energy.

When I am filled with things I want to paint, I can't help but express them. When I was in the UK for a residency, I was in such a state in a cafe that I couldn't sit still, so I borrowed the newspaper that the man sitting next to me was reading and painted on it.

When I was at home and felt the urge to paint, but happened to not have a single canvas on hand, I removed all the sliding doors in the house and painted on them."

Just as everyone gets their energy from eating, Kondo seems to get her own energy from drawing. So, what is the motivation to start a particular piece of painting? Where does Kondo Aki's "first stroke" come from?

“I don’t know for sure. When I’m painting I’m in a world without words and I can’t tell if I belong to the past or if I’m flying into the future.

When I pick up a brush and paint, my emotional barometer swings all the way up. My blood boils and I can't help but capture the vivid, gushing experience on the canvas.

This is certain, so perhaps picking up the brush is the signal that something is about to begin."

To paint is to live

Homo sapiens = wise man. Homo ludens = playful man. Homo faber = creator man.

Many different words have been proposed to define humans. They all have their merits, but when you look at Aki Kondo's journey, you start to think that humans are creatures who cannot help but express themselves.

It cannot be said for sure that this can be applied to all of humanity, but at least in her own case, she can definitely be defined as a "person of expression."

Yes, her creative work never stops.

For example, in September 2018, Kondo Aki held a solo exhibition at ShugoArts entitled "Waiting for that day, waiting for tomorrow, today." Flowers, vases, dining tables, portraits of people, big and small. As always, the venue was filled with a variety of powerful and striking images.

Aki Kondo "Mother's Face" ©Aki Kondo, courtesy of ShugoArts

These works express the "mixture of memories of the past and future with the present." Kondo's environment when he created these works was harsh.

"I sat on the floor holding my huge pregnant belly and drew. Because there was a human inside my belly, it was different physically and stamina-wise, so I couldn't draw for long periods of time, but my emotions were running wild, and because I could draw less than usual, each piece felt large and heavy."

Yes, she was carrying a life within herself at the time: she had been married earlier that year and found out she was pregnant.

But that wasn't all that happened. Two weeks after they registered their marriage, her beloved husband died suddenly in India, where he had gone alone.

At the time of her solo exhibition, she spoke about how she felt when holding a brush in her hands:

"I couldn't help but feel the significance of the weight of these two lives, and I also thought seriously about my own life and death. My world had changed 180 degrees, and to be honest, I spent every day crying in grief, not knowing where to put my hope. But after a few months, I began to feel faint movements in the womb, and that gave me the courage to live.

And I realize that I am where I am today because of being born, because of the whole world that I was able to see because I was born.

For a while after I lost my husband, I was in a state where I didn't know if I was alive or dead. And yet, the baby I was holding in my arms was a "lump of life." During that time, my perspective on life and death changed dramatically.

For me, living and drawing are directly connected, so of course this influences my paintings.

Ten months, raising a human in the womb. Meeting a loved one. One day death. A mother risking her life to give birth to a child. And the many miracles we experience in the world we are born into. All of these are my now. When I thought about what it means to live in the now, the paintings that remember the now were the most real things for me as an individual. I think imagination and reality each have their own weight.

That's why I want to paint with a voice that reverberates throughout the sky, like a baby's first cry. That's all I can think about right now.

"You can't draw in this world after you die. I want to come across a painting that really grabs you in the heart. I draw with that thought in mind every day."

Have screens and books ever been so bright and dazzling?

Lately, I can't help but feel that Kondo Aki's paintings are becoming increasingly brighter and more dazzling.

The works painted between 2019 and 2020 have been compiled into his first collection, "Happiness Here."

Pancakes, apples, cups and toys. Portraits of mothers and children, and all kinds of flowers. All the things we take for granted and see in front of us every day are depicted with a vivid brightness. And they have an astonishing presence. Just being able to confirm that these things are there makes me feel so fulfilled. As the title of the book suggests, "Happiness that is here" is right here.

Many of the paintings in this series were drawn from the artist's own memories.

"I was painting in my parents' house in Sapporo, in my six-tatami room, when I found some treasures from my childhood in the closet and drawers.

When I came into contact with those things and smelled them, all of my forgotten memories came flooding back. I felt relieved, like I had found myself again. I remember feeling relieved. I closed my eyes and drew slowly, as if I was trying to confirm something in the darkness."

The motifs depicted are diverse. Where do they come from?

"I was able to remember things while I was drawing them. I would draw while thinking that there must be a reason why I remembered this. Every day, just before I finished drawing, I would realize the true nature of the emotion I was trying to recall."

Particularly memorable are the repeated images of mothers and children, and the many flowers.

"Happiness is Here" (ShugoArts) Exhibition view ©Aki Kondo, courtesy of ShugoArts

"I can only draw and talk about my own experiences and things that resonate with me, so I have no choice but to draw people who are related to me. That said, I don't want to show that my mother and child are like this through this statue of mother and child. There are emotions inside me that I can only express by drawing a mother and child, and I drew those.

Indeed, these mother-child statues were created using me and my son as models, but when I looked at myself in the mirror holding my child, I somehow felt like I understood, "Oh, this is how my mother raised me." Then, when I shifted my eyes to my son in her arms, I remembered how I felt as a child and felt a strange sensation. A mother is a great presence for her child, but a child is even greater for a mother.

The mother and child statue shows that they are the light that gives life to each other. They are both alive thanks to a great being. I thought that for everyone, there is a being that is connected to them by such a great, warm, big life. I wanted to express this, so I drew the mother and child statue.

Some of the flowers are from my memory or recollections, while others are of flowers that were actually in front of me just a moment ago.

In either case, however, I feel that rather than wanting to paint the flower itself, I am more likely to use the shape of a flower to paint something else.

I feel that flowers that accompany living people, flowers dedicated to those who have passed away, and flowers that simply bloom in fields or among concrete without being for anyone are all beautiful when I look at them. I also think that beauty is a strong and wonderful thing. Flowers teach me many things.

Come to think of it, I have received flowers since my children were born, and I thought the congratulatory flowers were a beautiful thing, as they made me feel proud and dignified.

Flowers don't talk, but they can give you strength just by being there and close to you. I want my paintings to have that kind of presence, too."

The brightness that Kondo Aki's work exudes does not diminish even when it is printed as a collection of her works. In order to capture the brightness and sense of life that her paintings have and to fix it on the pages, countless ingenious printing, binding, and editing techniques must have been used.

The collection also includes pages interspersed with close-ups of the details of the paintings.

Kondo Aki's paintings are quite "thickly painted." If you look at them from a slight angle, you can see that the paint is extremely thick. On pages that zoom in on a particular part, you can clearly see the three-dimensionality and materiality of the painting even on the page.

Aki Kondo "Flower of Joy" ©Aki Kondo, courtesy of ShugoArts

Looking at the details and then returning to the big picture, you become engrossed in the bright images that appear one after another as you turn the pages. Opening a collection of Kondo Aki's works goes beyond the mere act of reading; it is an act of savoring a dazzling experience. Every page contains the "trembling of life" and the "joy of life," and from the collection as a whole you can sense that the "origin of life" is certainly there.

Anyone who keeps this book close to them will surely feel compelled to peer into its pages at every opportunity, just as Aki Kondo never stops drawing.

"Yes, I want to be close to people through my paintings as long as I'm alive. I want to paint light."

I want to continue to paint beautiful pictures that make people's feelings rainbow-colored."

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This article is

This was written by Hiroyasu Yamauchi specifically for Aki Kondo's "Happiness Here."

Kondo Aki's "Happiness is Here" is available to purchase here .