Ryuki Yamamoto

signed in Japanese, titled in Japanese and dated 2008 on the reverse

There are very mild cracks on Superman's red cape, possibly due to humidity fluctuations. Otherwise, the work is generally in good condition. There are no apparent condition issues with the work.
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Wielding a staggering eye for the finest of details, Ryuki Yamamoto makes paintings that reveal a weathered soul whose arsenal of wisdom is prodigious.  Trained at Tokyo Zokei University where he had studied Fine Art, Yamamoto displays an artistic sensibility well beyond his years.  His profound capacity for self-reflection is evident in his relentless efforts at producing portraits of himself.  However, a cursory glance at his oeuvre of work begs the question: how can compositions saturated with figures, hundreds and thousands of them, be categorized as "self-portraits"?  Yamamoto's signature brand of self-portraiture defies the conventional and proposes instead, the espousal of a mass representation where countless renderings of the artist constitute a self-portrait.  Herein lies the true revolution—successfully captured on canvas is squarely the critical distance generated between the artist and himself.

 

Ryuki Yamamoto's most recent solo exhibition held at Mizuma Art Gallery in Tokyo, Japan was Shi Shin Kei ("Scene in My Heart").  In his statement, he coined his style "super privatism."  On such a pensive, quiet matter as his own mental landscape, the artist routinely offers vast compositions that put forward a multitude of figures.  Action practically erupts out of the canvas, culminating in what is supposed to be his personal, super private introspection.  This very paradox is perfectly illustrated and thoroughly exemplified in his masterpiece of late, Bullied by Justice.  No longer covering the painting with numerous replicas of himself, Yamamoto forays into tackling external forces.  In this work, Yamamoto has included a host of the most popular cartoon characters and superheroes from best-selling American comic books. 

Anchoring the frenzied spread of momentum are the two naked figures in the middle, to which all respective acts of attack and paths of energy seem to be directed.  His cape unravelling behind him, Batman hurls a gas bomb out of the lower left.  Above, The Thing and Invisible Woman of the Fantastic Four are poised for combat while a couple of G.I. Joes are already forging their way forward into the battle zone.  Spiderman swings into the scene just as Captain America makes his grand entrance.  Having gotten his spinach fix of the day, Popeye charges toward the center.  Not to be outdone, the Hulk displays his gargantuan strength and lifts an entire tank with his bare hands.  Superman flies to the site with Wolverine trailing closely behind.  Wearing his magician's hat with his adorable ears protruding out is Mickey Mouse in the lower right, waving his magic wand.  The act of importing beloved figures from American popular culture into the rarefied realm of art invokes the spirit of Pop Art, a movement that marries itself so seamlessly to America and its capitalist ideals.  These very ideals are precisely what our American icons of justice happen to personify.  However, instead of being righteously protected by their powers, our protagonists who are writhing and thrashing about in the center have become the helpless victims of blatant aggression. 

                Through this epic work of art, Ryuki Yamamoto has graduated from ponderings on self-relativization onto examining the capricious dynamics as well as delicate balance of power between Japan and America.  On this, he makes his opinion very clear via pictorial means.  Employing numerous modes of soft power, most notably its pervasive popular culture followed by an excess of commodities and a celebration of profit, America exerts its hegemonic influence over Japan and much of the world.  Great disorder ensues and the ordinary, defenseless human being falls under its might. Drawing from Japan's rich visual tradition then, Yamamoto stealthily includes the background allusions to the past—hapless creatures that are being overwhelmed by all the superheroes so prominently featured in the foreground.  Subtle yet vulnerable, the two intertwined dogs to the lower left of the diptych are those derived from the Edo masterpiece Morning Glories and Puppies by the canonical 18^th century artist Okyo Maruyama.  Recreated dotingly and respectfully in Maruyama's original painting technique, the little things are involuntarily caught in the midst of imminent danger while simultaneously offering the overpowering vista a bit of solace.  Obscured between Invisible Woman and Captain American, behind Batman as well as behind the tank lifted by the Hulk are red and green hairy demons portrayed so often in classical Buddhist paintings.  The artist's deliberate placement of traditional Japanese iconography in the concealed recesses of the painting culminates in a desperate expression of suffocation. 

At the very heart of the sprawling chaos, Ryuki and Ryuki stumble together as they suffer as a result of each other.  Caught in a belligerent meditation on whether to accept eagerly the possibilities of a capitalist future that promises many luxurious rewards or to realize that his heritage is entering oblivion and traditional values are vanishing, the artist engages in a reflexive discourse with himself.  It is, after all, a self-portrait.

               

                Ryuki Yamamoto's versatile virtuosity is fully displayed in the ease with which he alternates between photorealist drawings of his naked selves and recreating the original styles of the superheroes he depicts, be it those of Walt Disney or Stan Lee, etc.  Though the deployment of comic characters, albeit American, appears consistent with much of Japanese contemporary art today, Yamamoto manages to rise above his peers in his formidable ability to insert multiple layers of intelligibility into his compositions.  Some parts apparent, some understated, his all-over image suffused with colour and detail in every corner mandates much more than a passive sensory feast for the eye.  While incorporating motifs that boast a global resonance, Yamamoto paints on his canvas a visual testament of current local sociology.