ARTIST

JIRO AIKO

After graduating from Tokyo University of the Arts with a major in Japanese Painting, Jiro Aiko has been actively working as a painter based in Tokyo.
He uses delicate materials such as pencil and sumi ink on washi paper to depict the fragility and vulnerability that lie within people.
The ink that gently traces the contours of faintly emerging portraits preserves the memory of fading existence, while the line running through the center of the expression emphasizes the ambiguity of the figures.
His major solo exhibitions include "The Thought That Someone Is Praying for You" (CLEAR GALLERY TOKYO, Tokyo, 2024), "A Pianissimo Armor" (TAKU SOMETANI GALLERY, Tokyo, 2023), and "fragments" (Ginza Tsutaya Books, Tokyo, 2022).

Artist Statement
My practice begins from a place of affirming qualities such as delicacy, fragility, vulnerability, fluctuation, and transience. The motifs I draw in pencil often have blurred, shaky, or astigmatic, unfocused expressions. This is not only a way of portraying fragility and changeability but also a way of maintaining a certain distance from capturing or fixing the subject into a definitive form.
Seeing is always wavering, unstable, and incomplete. The pencil, with its low ability to adhere permanently to the paper, reflects this and is intended to depict a presence akin to a precarious memory.
There were times when I suppressed my own sensitivity and vulnerability, tried to have firm opinions, and move forward without hesitation—only to feel a sense of discomfort. At those moments, what I was wearing must have been something like a “metal armor.” While it protected me, it also made it harder to connect with the sensitivity of others.
By shutting the lid on my own fragility, I also became less able to recognize the warmth of others, sometimes even becoming unconsciously aggressive. That is why I wish, as much as possible, to let go of that metallic armor, even if I am at times surprised by how easily I can break.
The black sumi ink lines carry multiple roles.
They act like an adhesive, anchoring the motif in place, but at the same time, they also possess the rigidity and tension of restraints or armor. The lines do not strictly follow the contours of the motif but instead provide subtle support without clearly defining its shape.
There is a conflict in my work between a longing for strength and hesitation toward losing sensitivity in the pursuit of it. These lines seem to have been drawn for protection, yet they also express a discomfort with having armor. This ambivalence is what I try to capture to create a subtle sense of fluctuation and tension on the surface of the work.