関西で育まれる表現 – Expressions Shaped in Kansai
Sokyo Annex
Oct 31 - Nov 14,2026
This exhibition, jointly organized by Sokyo and Eunoia, brings together five artists in a group exhibition titled Expressions Shaped in Kansai.
The theme of “Expressions Shaped in Kansai” is rooted in the history of modernism and the avant-garde that has unfolded throughout the region. From the New Art Movement of the Taisho period and the avant-garde movement in Kyoto’s Nihonga painting, to the Contemporary Art Discussion Group (Genbi), founded in 1952, the Gutai Art Association, active from 1954 to 1972, and the Kansai New Wave, artists in Kansai have repeatedly challenged established artistic frameworks and opened up new possibilities for expression. Underlying these practices is an avant-garde spirit that seeks to renew the very nature of artistic expression by questioning established values and institutions through the exploration of materials, techniques, the body, and space. Drawing on these historical currents, this exhibition explores how that spirit has been carried forward into the practices of contemporary artists and developed into new forms of expression.
The cultural and technical heritage accumulated in Kyoto and other parts of the region also provides an important context for understanding artistic expression in Kansai. Kyoto, in particular, continues to attract attention from both Japan and abroad as a place where diverse forms of expression cultivated over generations—including architecture, crafts, traditional performing arts, and painting—are preserved while giving rise to new interpretations and practices. The techniques and relationships with materials developed over centuries are not simply means of preserving past styles. For contemporary artists, they serve as points of departure for creating new forms of expression and reexamining established values and methods.
Sylvie Auvray, participating in the exhibition through Sokyo, has developed her work through an engagement with local materials and environments, including her time working at the Shiga Prefectural Ceramic Cultural Park in Shigaraki and her stays in Kyoto. Toru Ishii, meanwhile, draws on Itome Yuzen, a traditional resist-dyeing technique developed in Kyoto, while continuing to reinterpret its methods and processes through a contemporary artistic language. In both practices, the cultural heritage and techniques accumulated in the region are not merely traditions to be inherited; through the artists’ ongoing work, they are reinterpreted and opened up to new possibilities.
Representing Eunoia are Fumiaki Nagao, who incorporates the interventions of others and third parties into his work, using painting to explore ways of approaching and engaging with things that already exist; Nozomi Kishimoto, who constructs paintings through rhythm and musical sensibilities while investigating the relationship between space and perception; and Ryoko Furukawa, who incorporates the discrepancies between the images evoked by language and the objects themselves, often with a distinctive sense of humor.
The various regions of Kansai, including Kobe, have experienced the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake and subsequently rebuilt their cities and communities through processes of destruction and renewal. The transformation of existing environments and everyday life in the wake of natural disasters, followed by the emergence of new landscapes through reconstruction, is an essential part of the region’s history. Destruction and renewal, loss and reconstruction, and the reconsideration of existing things in new forms: these experiences and environments can also be understood as part of the context in which artistic expression emerges in Kansai.
The practices presented in this exhibition cannot be reduced to a single style or shared aesthetic. Rather, it is precisely because the artists begin from different materials, techniques, and ways of thinking that a diverse range of expressive possibilities emerges. Against the backdrop of historical avant-garde movements, locally rooted cultures and techniques, and changes in society and the environment, contemporary artists do not simply reproduce the forms of the past. Instead, they explore what to inherit and what to question through their own experiences and concerns. It is within these differences and expanding possibilities that we can glimpse one aspect of contemporary artistic expression in Kansai.
The exhibition is also the result of a collaboration between two galleries: Sokyo, based in Kyoto, and Eunoia, based in Kobe. Bringing together the distinct perspectives each gallery has developed through its ongoing engagement with artists, as well as the relationships cultivated through their respective activities, offers one example of the networks that sustain the art scene in Kansai. The everyday work of supporting artists, presenting their work, and connecting them with audiences both within and beyond the region also helps create the conditions in which contemporary artistic expression can flourish.
The history of the avant-garde in Kansai is not confined to a series of artistic movements in the past. Its spirit can also be found in ongoing contemporary practices that continue to question the relationships between tradition and innovation, the local and the outside world, and established techniques and new methods. Against the backdrop of the history and culture accumulated in Kansai, what do contemporary artists choose to inherit, what do they seek to move beyond, and what forms of expression do they bring into being?
Through the practices of five artists, Expressions Shaped in Kansai seeks to present both the historical depth of the region’s art and the possibilities that continue to unfold from it into the present. Between what has been passed down from the past and what is emerging here and now, the exhibition explores the current landscape of artistic expression nurtured by Kansai.
The cultural and technical heritage accumulated in Kyoto and other parts of the region also provides an important context for understanding artistic expression in Kansai. Kyoto, in particular, continues to attract attention from both Japan and abroad as a place where diverse forms of expression cultivated over generations—including architecture, crafts, traditional performing arts, and painting—are preserved while giving rise to new interpretations and practices. The techniques and relationships with materials developed over centuries are not simply means of preserving past styles. For contemporary artists, they serve as points of departure for creating new forms of expression and reexamining established values and methods.
Sylvie Auvray, participating in the exhibition through Sokyo, has developed her work through an engagement with local materials and environments, including her time working at the Shiga Prefectural Ceramic Cultural Park in Shigaraki and her stays in Kyoto. Toru Ishii, meanwhile, draws on Itome Yuzen, a traditional resist-dyeing technique developed in Kyoto, while continuing to reinterpret its methods and processes through a contemporary artistic language. In both practices, the cultural heritage and techniques accumulated in the region are not merely traditions to be inherited; through the artists’ ongoing work, they are reinterpreted and opened up to new possibilities.
Representing Eunoia are Fumiaki Nagao, who incorporates the interventions of others and third parties into his work, using painting to explore ways of approaching and engaging with things that already exist; Nozomi Kishimoto, who constructs paintings through rhythm and musical sensibilities while investigating the relationship between space and perception; and Ryoko Furukawa, who incorporates the discrepancies between the images evoked by language and the objects themselves, often with a distinctive sense of humor.
The various regions of Kansai, including Kobe, have experienced the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake and subsequently rebuilt their cities and communities through processes of destruction and renewal. The transformation of existing environments and everyday life in the wake of natural disasters, followed by the emergence of new landscapes through reconstruction, is an essential part of the region’s history. Destruction and renewal, loss and reconstruction, and the reconsideration of existing things in new forms: these experiences and environments can also be understood as part of the context in which artistic expression emerges in Kansai.
The practices presented in this exhibition cannot be reduced to a single style or shared aesthetic. Rather, it is precisely because the artists begin from different materials, techniques, and ways of thinking that a diverse range of expressive possibilities emerges. Against the backdrop of historical avant-garde movements, locally rooted cultures and techniques, and changes in society and the environment, contemporary artists do not simply reproduce the forms of the past. Instead, they explore what to inherit and what to question through their own experiences and concerns. It is within these differences and expanding possibilities that we can glimpse one aspect of contemporary artistic expression in Kansai.
The exhibition is also the result of a collaboration between two galleries: Sokyo, based in Kyoto, and Eunoia, based in Kobe. Bringing together the distinct perspectives each gallery has developed through its ongoing engagement with artists, as well as the relationships cultivated through their respective activities, offers one example of the networks that sustain the art scene in Kansai. The everyday work of supporting artists, presenting their work, and connecting them with audiences both within and beyond the region also helps create the conditions in which contemporary artistic expression can flourish.
The history of the avant-garde in Kansai is not confined to a series of artistic movements in the past. Its spirit can also be found in ongoing contemporary practices that continue to question the relationships between tradition and innovation, the local and the outside world, and established techniques and new methods. Against the backdrop of the history and culture accumulated in Kansai, what do contemporary artists choose to inherit, what do they seek to move beyond, and what forms of expression do they bring into being?
Through the practices of five artists, Expressions Shaped in Kansai seeks to present both the historical depth of the region’s art and the possibilities that continue to unfold from it into the present. Between what has been passed down from the past and what is emerging here and now, the exhibition explores the current landscape of artistic expression nurtured by Kansai.