Details:

Typical of Hiramatsu’s paintings, "Phantom" presents a lone, elusive figure framed within a haze of muted colors. The subject wears a tight pompadour that resembles a hat, another one of Hiramatsu’s motifs, and has a high pointed collar, perhaps a Vampire searching for blood, or a Rockabilly watching a concert.
Framed: 20.2 x 24.1 in.

① Artwork:

Phantom

Typical for the artist’s oeuvre, this painting presents a lone, elusive figure framed within a haze of muted colors. The subject wears a tight pompadour that resembles a hat (another one of Hiramatsu’s motifs) and has a high pointed collar, perhaps a Vampire searching for blood or a Rockabilly watching a concert.

Tenki Hiramatsu is a Japanese-born painter based in Karlsruhe, Germany, whose work typically involves shadowy, noirish characters, adrift within abstract landscapes. These subjects maintain a blank mysteriousness, the purview of outsiders, which allows Hiramatsu to move freely between dissimilar genres and styles. Hiramatsu's work rewards extended viewing - his figures start to look hazy and parallax, like the sound of tape warping; they leave the impression of something seen from the window of a fast-moving train: always receding, haunting in their elusiveness. Through a disciplined color palette and tone, Tenki spawns avatars from his subconscious, evoking either freedom or isolation and sometimes both. In the way that Albert Camus or Osamu Dazai write about the internal state of the modern human, Hiramatsu evokes this estranged meditation within the confines of the canvas.

Specs:

23.6 inches
19.7 inches
with frame
24.1 inches
20.2 inches

③ Artist:

Tenki Hiramatsu

Tenki Hiramatsu is a Japanese-born painter based in Karlsruhe, Germany, whose work typically involves shadowy, noirish characters, adrift within abstract landscapes. These subjects maintain a blank mysteriousness, the purview of outsiders, which allows Hiramatsu to move freely between dissimilar genres and styles. Hiramatsu's work rewards extended viewing - his figures start to look hazy and parallax, like the sound of tape warping; they leave the impression of something seen from the window of a fast-moving train: always receding, haunting in their elusiveness. Through a disciplined color palette and tone, Tenki spawns avatars from his subconscious, evoking either freedom or isolation and sometimes both. In the way that Albert Camus or Osamu Dazai write about the internal state of the modern human, Hiramatsu evokes this estranged meditation within the confines of the canvas.

Tenki Hiramatsu was born in 1986 in Wakayama, Japan, and lives and works in Karlsruhe and Leipzig, Germany. The artist received a BA from Nihon University College of Art in Tokyo, Japan (2009) and studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Karlsruhe, Germany (2016 to 2019).

Hiramatsu has mounted recent solo exhibitions at Half Gallery in New York, NY (2024); Sebastian Gladstone in Los Angeles, CA (2024); Kunstverein Wilhelmshoehe in Ettlingen, Germany (2024); Staedtische Galerie Karlsruhe in Karlsruhe, Germany (2023), Castle Gallery in Los Angeles, CA (2023), and Barbara Seiler Gallery in Zürich, Switzerland (2022).

He has participated in group exhibitions at Fondation Fernet-Branca in Saint-Louis, France (2024); Europa in New York, NY (2023); Hive in Los Angeles, CA (2021); and Kunsthalle Basel in Basel, Switzerland (2017).

Tenki Hiramatsu:
Phantom, 2023
Oil and acrylic on wooden panel in artist’s frame
19.7 × 23.6 inches /