Tomoo gokita biography

Tomoo Gokita was.
Tomoo Gokita is a leading Japanese contemporary artist on the international art scene.
Tomoo Gokita started out as a graphic designer and illustrator, but soon decided to devote himself to art.

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Tomoo Gokita

Tomoo Gokita (born 1969 in Tokyo) developed his signature style of monochromatic and greyscale painting from his career as a graphic designer in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Inspired by vintage magazines, film stills, pornography, and postcards he produced a series of newsprint books, some of which gained cult status, such as Lingerie Wrestling (2000). Gokita's penchant for pop culture immediately made him a celebrated figure within the fashion and music scenes, but the attention left him feeling creatively stifled. In 2005, he set aside graphic design entirely for the unconstrained artistic freedom of painting and drawing. From the beginning of his career as an artist, Gokita has worked in a broad but distinctive range of styles and subject matter. His pencil and ink drawings range from suburban scenes depicted in photo-realistic detail to cartoonish renditions of wrestler masks. Earlier canvases from the late 2000s tend towards ethereal abstraction, be it writhing organic forms, tessellating geometric patterns, or heavily distorted figures isolated wit

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Tomoo Gokita

Born in Tokyo, Japan, 1969.

Lives in Tokyo, Japan.

SELECTED SOLO SHOWS

2018
Blum & Poe, Los Angeles, California.
Tokyo Opera City Art Gallery, Tokyo, Japan. PEEKABOO.
McNamara Art Projects, Hong Kong. HOTEL PARAISO.

2017
Mary Boone Gallery, NYC, NY. Beauty.
Taka Ishii Gallery, Tokyo, Japan. Holy Cow.

2016
Mary Boone Gallery, NYC, NY. Out of Sight.

2015
Bill Brady Gallery, Miami, Florida. Damage Control.
Honor Fraser Gallery, Los Angeles, California. Bésame Mucho.

2014
Kawamura Memorial DIC Museum of Art, Sakura, Japan.
Mary Boone Gallery, NYC, NY.

2012
Bill Brady Gallery, Kansas City, Missouri. Secret Life.
Taka Ishii Gallery, Tokyo, Japan. Variety Show.

2010
Aliceday Gallery, Brussels, Belgium. Funland.
ATM Gallery, NYC, NY. Wildest Dreams.
Taka Ishii Gallery, Tokyo, Japan. (with Erik Parker)

2009
Honor Fraser, Los Angeles, California. Heaven. ATM Gallery, NYC, NY. Champion Carnival.

2008
Taka Ishii Gallery, Tokyo, Japan. Tomoo Gokita.

2007
Honor Fraser, Los Angeles, California. Vanity Drunko.

2006

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Tomoo Gokita

BIOGRAPHY

Tomoo Gokita (1969, Tokyo) lives and works in Tokyo. His drawings in pencil, charcoal and ink on paper began to receive attention in the late 1990s. His popularity grew nationally and internationally after the publication in 2000 of ‘Lingerie Wrestling’, a collection of his works to date. Although he is best known for his black and white works, he has actually used a rich range of visual vocabularies to produce a variety of works, including series of blue paintings, stencil works, collages and sculptures. Since the beginning of 2020, Gokita has returned to painting in colour. Gokita uses soft tones and a unique palette to tackle a wide range of subjects. The paintings combine seemingly effortless expression and rich textures to suggest a new evolutionary step in the artist's oeuvre. Gokita has absorbed an extraordinarily wide range of elements from various styles in his own way. His unique attitude towards artistic production directly communicates the pleasure he takes in painting.
In 2012, his work was presented in ‘The Unseen Relationship: Form and Abs