Naofumi MARUYAMA, Kicking the Water (not only replacing), 2022
Naofumi MARUYAMA Kicking the Water
Dates：Saturday, September 24 – Saturday, November 5, 2022
Venue: ShugoArts
Hours: 12pm – 6pm, Closed on Sun, Mon and Public Holidays
Curated by Minako Ishii
*The opening reception will not be held this time. Due to the COVID-19 outbreak, we have shortened our opening hours.
Exhibition Info
Press Release PDF
Naofumi MARUYAMA Works and Info
Installation movie
I wonder where we are standing
My gaze is sucked into roads and puddles after rain
There I see trees, sky and the cityscape
Not shown are my feet
I wonder where I exist
The two parallel worlds
Kicking the water
Its surface starts to ripple, and the two worlds blend together
We are standing where those two meet
And then a painting comes to life
Naofumi MARUYAMA, August 2022
Like a landscape reflected on the surface of water, Naofumi Maruyama’s paintings keep creating ripples on the canvas. The viewpoint is not fixed, and the paintings spread out into the world outside the canvas as if blotting it out, connecting and disconnecting from the images that each viewer has for his paintings. Mountains blend with rivers, rivers blend with the sky, and they blend with us. There is another world, free from the world full of terminology.
Maruyama paints by spreading water on the canvas, allowing the canvas to absorb the paint through water. He says, “I work in a ‘place’ like a wetland,” which allows the colors, shapes, and the artist’s purpose to change continuously during the process of painting. Through the medium of water, Maruyama has explored his interest while asking such questions as what kind of images can be cultivated in an unstable and fluid environment, and how they appear in an unstable and fluid reality.
Naofumi MARUYAMA, Kicking the water (during this time), 2022
While paintings have a material aspect, they are not static entities. As time and place change, so does the meaning. As a receptacle that accepts this freedom, Maruyama’s paintings, with their wobbling and elusive qualities, actually present excellent strength in addition to their flexibility.
After exhibiting a group of works created exclusively with gray paint presented in 2018, this exhibition will once again demonstrate the appeal of diverse colors as well as a new group of works, including a large painting over three meters in length.
ShugoArts, August 2022
Naofumi MARUYAMA, Kicking the Water (precisely for this reason), 2022
Drawings for painting at Maruyama’s atelier