SEIZAN Gallery New York is pleased to announce Unconscious River, a solo exhibition of works by Japanese painter Toshiyuki Kajioka. The Project Space of our newly opened gallery on West 26th offers an intimate setting for the exhibition of five recent works, including “Yoru no Kawa/ Unconscious River,” completed this year.

From a distance, Kajioka’s monolithic paintings appear to be flat black rectangles. Up close, the viewer finds meticulously detailed brushwork of sumi ink and graphite pencil. Labor intensive strokes of graphite subtly reflect lighting. The artist states the image is a riverscape, yet the work possesses all the intense, experiential characteristics of abstract painting.

Kajioka has single-mindedly painted the surface of flowing water for the past twenty years. Ever since he found this as his ultimate subject matter in his twenties, Kajioka has devoted considerable time to observing the riverscape in the evening. As a daily routine, he walks to the waterfront in his neighborhood, often staying until sunrise. Back in the studio he recreates images from his memories of flowing water. Some are calm, others are aggressive. Kajioka’s paintings capture time and being in transcendental wildness.

Toshiyuki Kajioka was born in 1978 in Tokyo. He completed the MFA program at Kyoto University of Arts. Recent solo presentations include “Edge of Night” (SEIZAN Gallery, Tokyo, Japan, 2021) and “Art on Paper” (SEIZAN Gallery Booth, New York, NY, 2021). His works have been included in several group exhibitions including “Toshiyuki Kajioka & Kengo Takahashi” (SEIZAN Gallery New York, NY 2022), “META” (Kanagawa Kenmin Hall, Kanagawa, Japan, 2021), “On This Shore” (SEIZAN Gallery, New York, NY, 2021), “ART PARIS” (Paris, France, 2020) and “ULTRA 002” (Spiral, Tokyo, Japan).