The inkblot looked like me – by Susumu Matsuura

About

Susumu Matsuura’s theme is “humans”, and most of his work expresses human emotions. He is interested in looking at the two-sided nature of human beings, who harbour both positive feelings and greed.

In 2016, Susumu’s hand-produced silk screen artificial propagation city was displayed in Tokyo. This work was based on his view that even natural objects found in cities have been put there artificially.  The theme of this work is that all objects there are operated by human hands.

Susumu went on to produce a series of works called Caress a Cat, which explores the theme of "healing", expressing the stress and loneliness he felt while traveling across Europe.

After returning to Japan, he produced the work Archives of the amorphous clouds of people, a woodblock print depicting the similarity of faces in a crowd whom he photographed in sightseeing spots while in Europe. The work presents an image of people gathered in a “location”, which is also created by people, as a kind of moving swarm.

The works on show at the Foundation have “human feelings” as their main theme: symmetrical portraits inspired by the Rorschach test; the feelings of depression that the artist himself has experienced; or the healing process of pet therapy, as in Caress a Cat.

Notes for Editors:

Susumu Matsuura (b.1989) specializes in silk screen print making. His works resemble traditional portraits with a somewhat cynical touch. He received a Bachelor in Fine Arts from Dohto University, Hokkaido, Japan.  Susumu has won several awards, including the Shouou Foundation Award for Art Studies Abroad in 2016, which led him to travel and work in Europe for a year. His solo exhibitions include: persona (2013), Red and Blue Gallery, Tokyo; artificial propagation city (2015), Sapporo station Art box, Japan; artificial propagation planet (2016), Tokyo Wonder site Shibuya, Japan; stranger (2017), gallery PRÁM, Czech Republic; and healing (2017), Agalab, Netherlands. His work has also been displayed in numerous group exhibitions, including: Tokyo Wander Wall 2015, Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, Japan; 60th CWAJ Exhibition, Highfield Hall Falmouth, America; Shell Art Award 2017, National Art Centre Tokyo, Japan; CampBasel Revisited (2017), A-Space, Basel, Swizerland; and Who are you? Susumu Matsuura - Hanae Nakamura Contemporary Print Exhibition (2018), Abashiri Museum, Japan.

The Daiwa Anglo-Japanese Foundation is a UK charity supporting links between Britain and Japan. It carries out its work through three main activities: awarding scholarships, giving grants to individuals and institutional partners to encourage UK-Japan collaboration; and organising a series of seminars, book launches and exhibitions at the Foundation’s headquarters in central London. The Foundation has provided substantial support for the arts in both countries since its inception, supporting exhibitions, artist-in-residence schemes, tours, education programmes and the Daiwa Foundation Art Prize. For further information: exhibitions@dajf.org.uk