A Blue Cat and a Grandma Collage

One day, when I was 8, I had to draw my mom as a homework assignment. After painting my mom's face. I worked on the background, adding bright red. Strangely, my mom's face looked like it shrank as I changed the background. I was shocked to see how colors change what we perceive in our minds and with our eyes. That was when I decided to become an artist. I worked on sketches, pencil drawings, and design all day from morning to night, and sometimes even in my dreams in order to enter an art college. i was able to enter art school in Tokyo, majoring in textile design, and stayed in Tokyo after college to work as a graphic designer. After 8 years of this hectic lifestyle, I felt like I was totally lost. I knew I needed to change everything right then. I chose to leave Japan, and went to Los Angeles, California, and then, to Eugene, Oregon, to work on my art and my life. I worked for a clay artist, and went to the University of Oregon to study more about art, design and English. Then, I worked at a design office as a graphic designer, and another company as a web designer. Now, I know what I was looking for when I was doing that. I was looking for the answer these questions. “What’s my relationship with design? What’s my relationship with art?” I was frustrated that I couldn’t get any answers. I began to think, “If there is a God of art, they must hate me! Fine! I hate them too!” I suffered through a year in which I could not create anything. I deeply realized I just have to keep creating art, otherwise I will be dead, even if the God of art hates me. In 2007, when I was working as a graphic designer, one of my clients misordered and gave me an illustration job, not a graphic design job. But, for some reason, I decided to take that job. That illustration job reminded me of the homework when I drew my mom back in elementary school. I felt like I finally found the answer that I was looking for the whole time! This is when I really started to be an illustrator and artist. After 9 years of living in America, I returned to Japan in 2008. In 2014, I opened an office/ workshop in a little port town in Fukuoka with people who work on town development and planning. I started to consider art from a social point of view. That was also a big turning point for me. In 2017, I started to take story classes with professor Minoru Meguro, learning the art of poetry and literature. I started to develop a broader love for the existence of art.