White Cube has announced representation of Minoru Nomata. The artist’s first solo exhibition in Greater China at White Cube Hong Kong will open on 8th September 2021.
Born in 1955, Nomata was raised in Tokyo’s industrial district of Meguro during a period of rapid urban and economic growth in Japan. Fascinated by the city’s expanding metropolis, over the past four decades the artist has created a lexicon of imaginary buildings, structures and monoliths which celebrate the machine aesthetic and ingenuity of structural design throughout the ages.
Often featuring a single monumental structure that dominates an imagined, ambient landscape, Nomata’s paintings are characterised by a masterful use of light to give form to fantastical yet familiar subject matter. The artist has commented that, in some ways, his works are ‘self-portraits’ and his buildings can be seen as a reflection of his own state of mind: his hopes, anxieties and belief in an ever-changing world.
Following his online ‘Introductions’ presentation in 2020, Nomata’s first solo exhibition at the gallery opens at White Cube Hong Kong from 8th September – 13th November 2021. Titled ‘UNBUILT’, the show includes works from several series spanning the years 1987 to 2020.
About the Artist
Minoru Nomata (born 1955, Tokyo) lives and works in Tokyo. He studied design at the Tokyo University of the Arts, graduating in 1979 before taking up a position in an advertising agency in Tokyo. After five years Nomata left in order to focus on his painting practice, and in 1986 held his debut exhibition ‘STILL – Quiet Garden’ at the Sagacho Exhibit Space, an alternative gallery in Tokyo run by Kazuko Koike. Further solo exhibitions include Meguro Museum of Art, Tokyo (1993); Tokyo Opera City Art Gallery (2004); The Museum of Modern Art, Gunma, Japan (2010) and most recently at the Sagacho Archives, Tokyo (2012, 2018). He is currently a Professor at the Joshibi University of Art and Design in Tokyo.
