Shaped by her personal history, Japanese artist Nana Funo creates paintings that capture her memories and experiences in their layers. Each complex work is built with overlapping motifs in acrylic paint, evoking the depth of woven tapestries, where each textile tells a story.
Funo starts with an initial base image, which she then covers with layers of paint depicting recurring motifs like figures, animals, flora, and fauna. She explains, “Things that existed long ago, things that most people no longer remember are sealed within the image, and these become the substance from which new stories arise.”
One painting, titled Fish Seed, Fruit Bones, and Things I Forget as Time Passes, is inspired by Funo’s desire to preserve precious memories of her young son. It features stylized flora that represent pine trees and mistletoe near her home, where the two spent many days walking hand in hand.
Funo has always used art to express how she sees the world. “Ever since I was a child, drawing and painting has been a natural part of my life,” she reveals. “I have repeatedly depicted the beauty and loneliness of the world, as if ruminating on them over and over again. It is through this that I have finally come to accept and affirm the fact that I am alive and am inevitably destined to die. Sometimes I feel the presence of something enormous and powerful, wondering why simply painting lines and applying color instills me with such joy and fulfillment.” She adds, “Painting means the world to me.”
Funo’s striking paintings were recently exhibited at Tomio Koyama Gallery in Tokyo for her solo exhibition, I Can Go There. So Can You. Check out more of her work on Instagram.
Shaped by her personal history, Japanese artist Nana Funo creates paintings that capture her memories and experiences in their layers.
Each complex work is built with overlapping motifs in acrylic paint, evoking the depth of woven tapestries, where each textile tells a story.
Nana Funo: Instagram
My Modern Met granted permission to feature photos by Nana Funo.
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