Pain and Vigor in Fuyuko Matsui’s Neo-Nihonga Paintings

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Japanese painter Fuyuko Matsui has made a big name for herself among Neo-Nihonga or “New Japanese” artists. She was recently named one of 2014’s most influential people by Nikkei Business, and is the first woman to receive a doctoral degree in Japanese painting (the first male was Takashi Murakami). Her artwork blends uniquely Japanese traditional painting techniques with dramatic subject matter. In her painting “Scattered”, a young woman moves through a scene as birds pull her long, black hair and dogs bite the flesh from her heels. Parts of her body scatter into a trail behind her. Despite her disfigurement, the woman has the vigor and grace of a Botticelli-esque Renaissance goddess and stylings of a Japanese yūrei. This type of contrast between tranquility and physical pain is an example of Matsui’s signature style, who enjoys provocative themes. Her most recent exhibition centered on the theme of narcissism through highly detailed silk paintings that portrayed her self-described “personality disorder”. For her much anticipated “The Cycle of Life and Death”, which will not open until January 2017, Matsui is now planning 48 new silk paintings.

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