Artist Spotlight: E’wao Kagoshima

E’wao Kagoshima is a Japanese artist who blends painting, drawing, and collage in his two-dimensional work. He was an artist who came of age in post-war Japan and later moved to New York in 1976.

His pieces exist primarily in private collections around the world. While he had a strong presence in the East Village art scene in the 1980s, it’s been years since his work has been widely seen in New York. His stark surrealistic style features common objects to strange and unexpected scenes.

Yet, he himself has noted that the work is not supposed to make sense because the world no longer makes sense. And this is what I love about him. Kagoshima absorbs his surroundings and dispels them in eclectic bits. He doesn’t worry about figuring them out because that simply won’t work. He says to just suspend your disbelief and allow yourself to become captivated.

In a piece titled Obstacle, there is a singular centerpiece that resembles a monolith that could be a single giant rock or cut from stone. Although, from another perspective, it could also be a severed, upside-down groin of ambiguous gender. I find that the uncertainty of this piece – as well as the blend of background colors – simultaneously captures the viewer while leaving them with lingering emotion.

Another piece titled Today’s Catch B produced a similar stirring of emotions within me. It depicts a heaping can of trash along with two dog-like animals. Both the trash and the animals are leashed, which are held by two humans. They tethered objects are also seated on larger shapes: an Earth-like sphere and an encased human foot. There is also a red sphere floating in the distance. I fight against myself to do as Kagoshima says for this piece and to suspend my disbelief. The randomness is a part of the beauty.

Kagoshima’s unique style has become known through the canon of Japanese Pop Art, and each time I view his work I feel as though I dive deep into the cultural subconscious that he conveys.