The Painting is VR on His Inner Vision / アーティスト 設楽陸 / Artist Riku Shitara

Website
https://taneristudio.wixsite.com/mysite/biography

Instagram
https://www.instagram.com/rikushitara/

facebook
https://www.facebook.com/riku.shitara

個展(Solo exhibition)
"N-mark" http://www.n-mark.com/projects_shitara.html

幼い頃、TVゲームが禁止されていて学校の勉強ノートや紙の上に自分で妄想し考えたゲーム世界を描き独りプレイしていたことが絵の構図、色彩感覚に大きく影響している。また当時、喘息とアトピーを患っており、自分の身体的な弱さと現実世界への違和感を覚え「ここではないどこか」の存在を意識し始めた。こうした一見ネガティブで私小説的な記憶をベースとし絵が描かれているが、画面は原色で明るく構成され虚構性が高く、どこまでも短絡的で快楽的に見えるかもしれない。しかし、私にはここ最近の現実世界も内なる現実のどちらが妄想なのか正直分かりづらい時がある。だから私は虚構の延長線上に現実があり、さらにその先には「何もなさ」無の世界がると仮説を立て絵を描いている。

1985年　愛知県生まれ

2008年に名古屋造形大学を卒業し、画家として活動。
2017年 愛知県瀬戸市に共同アトリエ「タネリスタジオ」を仲間と共に立ち上げる。

When I was a child, video games were not allowed by my parents. So I drew my imaginary game world on school notebooks and paper and played alone. It gave a great influence to me on the composition and color sense of the painting. At that time, I was suffering from asthma and atopy, and I felt a sense of discomfort with my physical weakness and the real world, and began to be aware of the existence of "Somewhere not to here." The paintings are based on these seemingly negative and personal memories. So that the canvas is composed of primary colors and highly fictional, it may look unconsidered works and optimistic. Sometimes I'm not sure which world is real. Therefore, I hypothesize that there is reality on the extension of fiction, and that there is a world of "nothing" beyond that, and I painted.

Shitara Riku

There is no overeagerness about creating a large work. Shitara Riku confronts his canvas with a bodily sensation as if he were painting a mural. Vivid colors and innocent images explode across his pictures. In his twenties, he seemed to be flinging the overflowing images wholeheartedly onto the canvas, and while his paintings were fun, there was also a stunning sense of a desperately poor offense and chaos.
Shitara belongs to the generation that underwent the baptism of the game culture in the 1990s. Critics say that the influence of computer games is notably reflected in his paintings, but, as a child, Shitara was not allowed to play video games at home. He was intensely enchanted by the screen images he could see over his friends’ backs as they enjoyed playing video games. He says he bravely copied strategy guides and cherished delusions of playing computer games in his mind. Such figurations eventually became the source of firm images to be painted.
Now in his thirties, Shitara has gained the resolution and confidence to live as a creator. It is reassuring that he has managed to unite intermingled moments and motifs as the exquisite taste of his paintings. He paints the past and the future, fiction and reality, tragedy and comedy, all simultaneously. Moreover, he boldly leads the viewer’s eyes. This is possible because it is a painting. He expresses himself so uprightly and straightforwardly that one might say he is honest to a fault.


There is something unearthly about the cherry blossoms in full bloom. Bombs like clusters of fruit or paper lanterns are playing with the flowers. A delusion of a world in a video game is unfolded in this painting. The bombs are a violent explosion of Shitara’s imagination. It is fascinating that his childhood recollections, the sense of despair amidst the coronavirus pandemic, and summer and winter are all united along the same line. This is an honest and straightforward expression, which boldly leads the viewer’s eye.

Takahashi Ayako