ITOMARISM : Kaleidoscope

JanKossen Contemporary is proud to present ITOMARISM : Kaleidoscope, an exhibition by Japanese contemporary artist Mari Ito. ITOMARISM : Kaleidoscope is the artists first exhibition in New York and will be on view from October 18, 2018 to December 1, 2018 with an opening reception on October 18 from 6-8pm.

Japanese artist Mari Ito (Tokyo, 1980), who has been living in Barcelona since 2006, studied traditional Japanese painting at Joshibi University of Art and Design in Tokyo. Mari Ito’s oeuvre is based on Animism, which finds it’s expression in long standing Japanese techniques. Much like how the Anthropocene deals with the planet after humans, Mari Ito’s organic alien plants that have been affected by yet continue to grow independently from humanity; Animalism is a post modern philosophical branch which posits that humans are simply animals, and deals with our place in the world when we stop thinking of humans as a force in control of nature. Ito invites us to reflect on the origins of desire, on our most irrational and personal impulses.

The Id or "das Es" (as Sigmund Freud would say) split off from the ego and the superego is the psychic —therefore the purest and most primitive— expression of our drives and aspirations. Ito's delicately formed creations come to life as they unfold into themselves, permanently striving to make their way towards awareness in their on-going search for the root of desire, whatever its nature. Completely opposed forces that actually complement and react to one another are interpreted by Ito in the same way, for they have the same value and form a duality that exists in natural harmony. The Romantics pioneered the concept of the sublime, of humanity needing to succumb to the awesome force of nature, normally shown with a small figure, or a person with their back turned towards the viewer, engulfed by their environment. Ito has completely excluded the figure, leaving only a representation of our base desires through personified flora.

Tokyo's Zeit-Foto Salon gallery represents Ito in Japan, alongside other artists such as Nobuyoshi Araki, Yuki Onodera and Daido Moriyama, while in Spain she has been working with Tatiana Kourochkina Galeria d'Art since 2012. Ito’s motif centers upon her childhood memories and experiences, those of loud colors combined with her studies in