In 2008, for the first time I went to New York to sell my work.

At that time, there was no iPhone and didn't know where to find galleries, but I decided to go to New York.

I decided to go anyway, because the demand for paintings in Japan had dropped considerably due to the Lehman Shock, and the street sales I was doing at the time and the exhibitions and sales at rental galleries were not doing well.

I had heard that New York was the home of painting, so I decided to check out every place I could find, and I brought a canvas with about a size 10 painting on it, as well as smaller works.

At that time, the situation of galleries in New York was not as clear as it is today through the Internet and other media.

I read in the guide book that the center of the art area was shifting from Chelsea to the Lower East Side, where the Jews first settled in New York, but I had no idea what that meant.

I didn't have much money then than I do now, so I decided to stay at a cheap inn called the Japanese Guest House.

It was 30 dollars a night. After that, I would often use this inn every time I went to New York.

When I landed at John F. Kennedy Airport, I took a shared bus with instructions from the inn.

I took the bus because it was an hour far from Manhattan and I didn't have the money to take a cab.

I don't remember the details of the bus anymore, but there were only colored people on it.

When we arrived at the inn, the driver told us to get off the bus and go here. But there was no sign of the inn.

I panicked, but I got off and looked carefully at the sign and saw the name of the inn in small letters.

To be continued

In this article, I will write about the art industry in the wake of the corona disaster.

Restaurants were particularly damaged by the new coronavirus.

So how was the art industry undergo?

Before the emerge of coronavirus, it was common to visit museums and galleries to view artworks.

However, this situation has now changed.

The pandemic has forced museums and galleries to close their doors.

As a result, artists have lost the opportunity to show and sell their works, and have been put in a difficult situation.

People are now less likely to visit the sites and see the works.

In response to this, the art industry is trying to regain its footing online.

Nowadays, you can freely view artworks online without going out.

And there are some benefits exclusive online, like interviews and discussions of those professionals.

Takuma Tanaka has been presenting and selling his works online for the past three years.

The advantage of online is that you can see the work from a distance without having to visit the studio.

On the other hand, there is a weak point that the texture and size of the work cannot be conveyed.

However, the use of images and video is beginning to make up for this shortcoming as much as possible.

At the Takuma Tanaka Studio, we have taken measures to prevent corona infection, so you can feel at ease when you visit the studio.

If you would like to visit us, please feel free to do so.

That's it for this time. Thank you very much for your time.

A interview about Takuma’s vision is now published on Yahoo! Finance.

Please click here to read

Takuma's work is now on exhibition in Aoyama, central Tokyo. If you are interested in please visit and see it!
This big work is now under dealing with American collector who recently opened a museum in Australia

How to think that we are less than moss

I happened to watch a news program and saw the snowfall information on my cell phone.

The world is a mess, and everyone is full of complaints. After all, there are risks like hyperinflation. It's no laughing matter for the wealthy. People who don't have money are also not funny. It is society that supports people, but society is also affected by the corona, global climate change, changes in the universe, changes in the sun's activity, and so on.

Humans happen to be living on the surface of this planet like moss in an interglacial period. We may look like we own the planet, but in the eyes of the whole world, we are nothing more than a thickened moss. Furthermore, we are one of the 7 billion or so people in the world, and we are no better than moss.

If you look at it that way, you don't have to be overly happy or sad about the human world, yourself, or the relationships around you.

This way of thinking is a core concept for me. It leads to the story of human sushi, which is also about looking at people from a bird's eye view and reflecting on the brutality of their actions. Also, the Cake Ship series is about a cake and a human being, which at first glance is difficult to connect, but when you look at the elements of the composition, the chemical formula of the carbohydrate cake is (CH2O)n, which is close to that of a human being, which is made up of H2O (human) and C (carbon). In fact, they have a lot in common.

In addition, the chromosomes of women and men are almost the same, and Mona Lisa depicted the faces of men and women on the same screen, and Picasso made it easier to understand.

Furthermore, there is a theory that humans and other living things have almost 99% of their DNA in common, and the idea of trees growing out of our heads was born out of the awareness that if hair can grow, then grass and even trees can grow out of our heads.

Although they are said to be different at first glance, the world is made up of a core of similarities, so if you take this into consideration, the core of my series of works is a reminder to not get too caught up in the details.

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

The special sale for December is now started. Please check if .

★Click here to the store

We have special sale every month.

The works we sell there has much affordable price than usual and there are some works experimental.

Last time, we talked about how "artistry" is hard to understand. That's when I came up with the idea of a "Takuma Medal". If we respond to something easy to understand, wouldn't a medal be easier to understand and respond to? I wanted to do such a social experiment.

The aim of the Takuma medal is to see if the price will rise. Also, is it easy to understand for ordinary people? I wanted to capture the complexity of art, which is why it is so hard to understand.

The Takuma Medal is not a currency. But I'm looking forward to seeing if it will be like Bitcoin.

Money has been in the hands of the state for a long time, but before that, gold and silver were in the hands of the state. However, it wasn't necessarily that way forever, as there was a time before that when it was traded by weight in gold and silver. Bitcoin is widespread, regardless of the country, and there is no state behind it.

The Takuma Medal is a medal issued by Takuma Tanaka. They are given value as money through auctions and second-hand sales and purchases. We think this is interesting. Please stay tuned for this game.

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

I've been painting for more than 15 years now, and I've come to feel that art is like air. This is both a good thing and a bad thing.

I've come to believe that the people who view art are also taking it for granted, just like me.

But in fact, this is not the case. I realized that there are many people who don't know much about art, but think it's somehow good or interesting.

There is a beautiful work of art painting stained glass in Ueno Station, the center of Tokyo. But no one stops to look at it.

I finally realized that those who have a strong interest in art, who think and feel a lot of things are in the minority in this world.

There is an artist called Banksy. He creates controversy by painting on the walls of towns and shredding sold works at auction houses.

He's not reaching out to core art lovers, but to people of around it, people who don't know about art but are interested in it.

Again, the question remains as to whether people are attracted to and react to the artistry or not.I found "artistry" to be a difficult and elusive subject.

This is Takuma Tanaka's Art Samurai Training Series.

When I was staying at a guesthouse in New York and going back and forth between Japan and New York, I met a rather cocky student named M. from Kyoto University. He told me that I was lacking in the logic and basic ideas of art.

Sure, I had learned how to draw, but I didn't have any knowledge of the logic of art or other fields of art. For example, architecture, photography and things that went beyond those, like gardens.

So I enrolled in Yotsuya Art Studium, an experimental art school in Yotsuya that was funded by Kinki University and was established at the time. It was an experimental school, famous for its cutting-edge instructors and experimental approach.

The chief director of the school was Kenjiro Okazaki, and I took his seminar and some classes. When I told Mr. Okazaki that I studied the law in Waseda University and studing for the bar exam, he asked me if I had learned basic law. In this way, we explored the basics, which is one of the characteristics of this school, and there were graduates from overseas art universities and foreign students who studied at japanese Art University.

The first fieldwork was to dismantle Rikugien. We all went to a garden called Rikugien in Tokyo and were given five pieces of paper. The assignment was to take apart Rikugien and show the whole picture. I was puzzled by this. To be continued.

Thank you very much for those who took interest in our Special Sale held from 1/11-4/11.

We wish our work satisfy those who got it.

Christmas Sale is now planned to be held in December.

Please Check.

We’ve got some report pictures from the Art Fair in Paris.

https://artspaces.kunstmatrix.com/en/exhibition/2634837/focus-art-fair-paris-2020#

I was thinking about going to Paris for this, but desisted for the current pandemic situation.

Some of my catalogs are there instead of me. So I hope they can reach to those who are potential to like my works.

My work is now exhibited in an Art fair in Paris.

Exhibition can be seen virtually too.

Please access here.

https://artspaces.kunstmatrix.com/en/exhibition/2634837/focus-art-fair-paris-2020#

There are 4 works.