Mio Kaneda "Warmth of Intimacy" （Gallery Caption）

Mio Kaneda "Warmth of Intimacy"

Finished

Artists

Mio Kaneda

Mio Kaneda (born 1963 in Tokyo / graduated from Tama Art University Graduate School of Fine Arts in 1988) began her career as an artist in printmaking, having initially studied graphic design at university but spending increasing time in a printmaking studio. Kaneda sought more direct expressions through drawing with charcoal and water-soluble crayons, and delicate oil painting on sized paper, eventually transitioning to canvas. She continues to explore the characteristics of materials and techniques and their possibilities for her expression, consistently creating flat works.

In recent years, Kaneda has participated in numerous major exhibitions at museums, such as "Artist File 2009: Contemporary Artists" (National Art Center, Tokyo, 2009), "Quintet: Five Star Artists" (Sompo Japan Nipponkoa Museum of Art, 2014), and "Gaze: Artists Confronting the Mystery of Seeing" (Gunma Prefectural Museum of Fine Art, 2019), receiving high acclaim.

Kaneda vividly depicts the ordinary events around him and subtle interactions with nature and living things in her daily life with a rich sensitivity. Her strokes on paper extend gracefully, and the moist, gentle colors layered on the canvas maintain an organic image that can be interpreted as either abstract or figurative. Combined with the poetic titles she assigns, her work stirs the viewer’s imagination. Kaneda, who believes that "drawing is also an act of thinking," values her diary-like practice of painting the roses in her garden and the sky each day throughout May. She questions whether "ordinary and close-by things might be the source of strength that supports a person." Through attentively capturing the subtle changes in her garden, she perceives invisible presences, atmospheric sensations, and humidity, reflecting on how to view the world with humility and questioning the existence of small forces that sustain life.

The exhibition title "The Temperature of Intimacy" suggests that the act of "seeing" goes beyond mere visual observation. The more than ten works on display, reflecting Kaneda's approach of not separating the act of seeing from the tactile sensation, will offer viewers an opportunity to experience this fusion through her work.