Kazuna Taguchi

Born in Tokyo, Japan, in 1979.

Graduated with a BFA in painting from Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music in 2003, Kazuna Taguchi was awarded the University's Purchase Prize (Graduation Exhibition). In the same year she received the university's Ohashi Memorial Prize and was selected for a Holbein Scholarship. She has also recently received a scholarship in the Agency for Cultural Affairs’ Program of Overseas Study for Upcoming Artists and is planning to reside in Vienna.
In 2008 she won the Namura Priza and in 2010 The Gotoh Memorial Prize Foudation Newcomer’s prize of art.

Major solo exhibitions include "It is as it is" at ShugoArts 2009 and "Half in Gray" at void (2009). Taguchi also gained significant attention from the group exhibitions "Chaosmos '05 -Unreal Reality", shown at the Sakura City Museum of Art (2005), "Trace Elements" at Tokyo Opera City Art Gallery (2008) and The Performance Space in Sydney (2008), "Somewhere between me and this world Japanese contemporary photography" at the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography (2012) and "Sleeping Beauty" at the Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art (2014).

The artist has attracted international attention for her ability to blur the border between photography and painting. Her work involves creating a monochrome acrylic painting that is then photographed to produce a finished image in what has been described as "an alchemy-like manner that manipulates painting and photography" (Kyoji Maeda, 17 Feb, 2006, evening edition, Yomiuri Shimbun). The result ensures a peculiar other-worldliness that is central to the attraction of Taguchi's work.

Submitted by CHRISTOPHE GUYE GALERIE