Yumiko Irei-Gokce

My work stands as an aesthetic bridge between two disparate cultures. I fuse Japanese perception, a sense of structure, space, color, texture, materials, and method into American Expressionistic art-making. I am a native of Japan living and working as an artist in the Chicago area.

In recent years, Works-on-Paper, featuring monotype printmaking and mixed-medium with drawing, has been my chief medium. My monotype print is pulled through the etching press after images are drawn directly onto the Plexiglas plate. I combine unconventional tools and methods including ; inkjet, photo-transfer, polymer intaglio, and collage in conventional fine art printmaking.

My imageries are rather representational yet conceptual. They resonate references to the worlds of landscape / earthscape. Plant-inspired organic growth, the mysterious forces of vegetation life, and outbursts of germination are often my subjects. Using the detail and flow of contours with visual masses and flux while implementing repetitive and vigorous strokes, I conceive the texture of earth -- gravel, soil, sand, sticks, twins, and mulch -- directly onto the surface of plate.

Alongside earthscapes, conflicting or seemingly irrelevant visual elements are juxtaposed...

Osaka University of Arts(formerly Naniwa University of the Arts)in Japan, obtained diplomas in Bauhaus method of graphic design under prominent;Josef Muller Brockmann of Switzerland, the Oxbow school of the Arts Institutes of Chicago for Printmaking and the certificate from Gakushoin;The School of Calligraphy in Tokyo.