Born 1959 in Aomori prefecture. In 1987, completed master’s degree program at Aichi University of the Arts. Moved to Germany in 1988 and enrolled at Kunstakademie Düsseldorf. After residing in Cologne, repatriated to Japan in 2000. Has exhibited in various places in Europe, the United States, Japan, and Asia since the late 1990s. Known for powerful portraits with eyes that gaze back at the viewer; drawing works produced daily; three-dimensional works in wood, FRP, ceramic, and bronze; and installations of little houses.
Nara creates his works directly and freely, bound by nothing. These works transcend barriers of language, cultural backgrounds, and eras; they are beloved by many people. The artist confronts the true essence of people and things, and is invariably honest; resulting in works that are like mirrors that reflect the viewers’ hearts back to them. In recent years, he has actively sent out his message on Twitter and Instagram, and regardless of where he may be in the world, he is connected with his friends in real time. And Nara is a traveler, in the truest sense of the word. At times he sets out on a voyage seeking his own roots. At other times, feeling a strong attraction to the spark of cultures that have persisted through the trials and tribulations of history, he visits and explores their lands. Treasuring the human relationships he has built through these encounters, he visits all kinds of places without being confined to the paradigm of art; like a traveling bard, he creates and presents his work for friends across the world.
SELECTED INDIVIDUAL EXHIBITIONS
2023
The Beginning Place, Aomori Museum of Art, Aomori, Japan
Ceramic Works, Pace Gallery, Seoul, South Korea
All My Little Words, Albertina Modern, Vienna, Austria
Reach Out to The Moon, Even If We Can't, Art Gallery of Western Australia, Perth, Australia
2022
Hello, How Can We Do a Nara Yoshitomo Show? Documents on Nara Yoshitomo’s Hirosaki Exhibitions 2002-2006, Hirosaki Museum of Contemporary Art, Hirosaki, Japan
Recent Work, Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
2021
Pinacoteca, Pace Gallery, London, UK
Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts, Kaohsiung, Taiwan
Kuandu Museum of Fine Arts, Taipei City, Taiwan
I Forgot Their Names and Often Can't Remember Their Faces but Remember Their Voices Well, Dallas Contemporary, Dallas, TX
Yoshitomo Nara, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA; traveling to Yuz Museum, Shanghai, China; Kunsthal Rotterdam, Rotterdam, Netherlands
2020
Rubell Museum, Miami, FL After all I'm cosmic dust, Pace, East Hampton, NY
Yoshitomo Nara: An Exhibition of Works From a Private Collection, Charles Moffett, New York, NY
2019
En/trance, Japan Society, New York, NY
Drawings Last 31 Years, Château La Coste, Le Puy-Sainte-Réparade, France
2018
Ceramic Works and…, Pace Gallery, Hong Kong, China
Drawings: 1988-2018, Kaikai Kiki Gallery, Tokyo, Japan
Your Dog, Asian Art Museum, San Francisco, CA
Sixteen springs and sixteen summers gone–Take your time, it won’t be long now, Taka Ishii Gallery Photography / Film, Tokyo, Japan
all things must pass, but nothing is lost / precious days around me, sometimes farther along, sometimes under my feet, Pace/Macgill Gallery, New York, NY
2017
Thinker, Pace Gallery, New York, NY
For Better or Worse: Works 1987-2017, Toyota Municipal Museum of Art, Toyota, Japan
At Tobiu, Tobiu Art Community, Shiraoi, Hokkaido, Japan
Will the Circle Be Unbroken, Daikanyama Hillside Plaza, Tokyo, Japan
2016
New Works, Stephen Friedman Gallery, London, UK
Picture Box, Kato Art Duo, Singapore Museum of National Taipei University of Education, Taipei, Taiwan
2015
Shallow Puddles, Blum & Poe, Tokyo, Japan
Stars, Pace Gallery, Hong Kong, China
Life is Only One: Yoshitomo Nara, Asia Society Hong Kong Center, Hong Kong, China
Johnen Galerie, Berlin, Germany
2014
A 3-Day Drawing Show, Sawada Mansion Gallery room 38, Kochi, Japan
Greetings from a Place in My Heart, Dairy Art Centre, London, UK
Print Works, Satellite, Okayama, Japan Blum & Poe, Los Angeles, CA
2013 | Pace Gallery, New York, NY
2012
a bit like you and me…, Yokohama Museum of Art, Yokohama, Japan; traveled to Aomori Museum of Art, Aomori, Japan; and Contemporary Art Museum, Kumamoto, Japan
The Little Little House in The Blue Woods, Towada Art Center, Aomori, Japan
Yoshitomo Nara Prints, 8/Art Gallery/Tomio Koyama Gallery, Tokyo, Japan
2011 | Print Works, Roppongi Hills A/D Gallery, Tokyo, Japan
2010
Ceramic works, Tomio Koyama Gallery, Tokyo, Japan
Nobody’s Fool, Asia Society, New York, NY
New Editions, Pace Prints, New York, NY
2009
Marianne Boesky Gallery, New York, NY
The Crated Rooms in Iceland – Yoshitomo Nara + YNG, Reykjavik Art Museum, Reykjavik, Iceland
2008
Yoshitomo Nara with Installation by YNG, Blum & Poe, Los Angeles, CA
Yoshitomo Nara + graf, BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead, UK
Galerie Zink, Munich, Germany
Galerie Meyer Kainer, Vienna, Austria
Chaguin, Misako & Rosen, Tokyo, Japan (collaboration with Hiroshi Sugito)
2007
Yoshitomo Nara + graf: Torre de Málaga, Centro de Arte Contemporáneo de Málaga, Spain
Yoshitomo Nara + graf, GEM, Museum of Contemporary Art, Den Haag, Netherlands
Johnen + Schoettle, Cologne, Germany
Berlin Baracke, Galerie Zink, Berlin, Germany
2006
Moonlight Serenade, 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa, Japan
Yoshitomo Nara + graf: A to Z, Yoshii Brick Brew House, Hirosaki, Japan
Stephen Friedman Gallery, London, UK
2005 | Home, graf media gm, Osaka, Japan Marianne Boesky Gallery, New York, NY
[...] individual exhibition from 1984
SELECTED COLLECTIVE EXHIBITIONS
2022
FRONT Triennial, Cleveland OH Protectors of Love and Peace (Tentative), YKG Gallery, Tokyo, Japan
2021 Human and Animal – Breathing Life into Clay, Museum of Modern Ceramic Art, Gifu, Japan
Youth, Yutaka Kikutake Gallery, Tokyo, Japan
2020
5,471 miles, Blum & Poe, Tokyo, Japan
STARS: Six Contemporary Artists from Japan to the World, Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, Japan
Oketa Collection: A New Decade, curated by Yayoi Kojima, Spiral Garden, Tokyo, Japan
At The Noyes House Blum & Poe, Mendes Wood DM and Object & Thing, The Eliot Noyes House, New Canaan, CT
2019
Weavers of Worlds, Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan
Masterpieces of The National Museum of Art, Osaka Clues for Art Appreciation, Toyohashi
2018
Create Your Own Original Doraemon, Mori Arts Center, Tokyo, Japan
WOW! The Heidi Horten Collection, Leopold Museum, Vienna, Austria
Niko Pirosmani, Albertina Museum, Vienna, Austria
Japanorama. A new Vision on art since 1970, curated by Yuko Hasegawa, Centre Pompidou-Metz, Metz, France
2017
Takahashi Collection, Contemporary Art Museum, Kumamato City, Japan
Cool Japan: A Worldwide Fascination in Focus, Museum Volkenkunde – the National Museum of Ethnology, Leiden, Netherlands
2016
Revalue Nippon Project: Hidetoshi Nakata’s Favorite Japanese Kogei, Panasonic Shiodome Museum, Tokyo, Japan
EARTH 2016: Roots and Routes, Aomori Museum of Art, Aomori, Japan
Horizon That Appears Out Of The Sleepy Woods, Stephen Friedman Gallery, London, UK
2015
COSMOS/INTIME La Collection Takahashi,Maison de la culture du Japon a Paris, Paris, France
Twentieth Anniversary Exhibition, Stephen Friedman Gallery, London, UK
Takahashi Collection: Mirror Neuron, Tokyo Opera City Art Gallery, Tokyo, Japan
Forever Young, Asia University Museum of Modern Art, Taichung, Taiwan
Today Is The Day: Proposal to the Future, Art Gallery Miyauchi, Hiroshima, Japan
2014
Everything Falls Faster Than an Anvil, Pace Gallery, London, UK
Takahashi Collection 2014: Mindfulness!, Nagoya City Art Museum, Nagoya, Japan
Exhibition of the Collection of the Yokohama Museum of Art (Part I), Yokohama Museum of Art, Yokohama, Japan
Carte Blanche, Pace Gallery, Chesa Büsin, Zuoz, Switzerland
Study from the Human Body, Stephen Friedman Gallery, London, UK
2013 | Damage Control: Art and Destruction Since 1950, Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington D.C.; traveled to Mudam Luxembourg, Luxembourg, and Universalmuseum Joanneum / Kunsthaus Graz, Graz, Austria
2012
San Antonio Collects: Contemporary, San Antonio Museum of Modern Art, San Antonio, TX
Print/Out: Multiplied Art in the Information Era, 1990-2010, Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
The Art of Cooking, Royal/T, Los Angeles, CA
2011
Future Pass: From Asia to the World, 54th Esposizione Internazionale d’Art, la Biennale di Venezia, Venice, Italy
New Works in Ceramics, Japan
2011
Toyota Municipal Museum of Art, Aichi, Japan Bye Bye Kitty!!!: Between Heaven and Hell in Contemporary Japanese Art, Japan Society, New York, NY
Collectors’ Stage: Asian Contemporary Art from Private Collections, Singapore Art Museum, Singapore
2010
Self Portrait: Watashi to iu tannin [Me as Others], Takahashi Collection, Hibiya, Japan
Ateliers d’artistes, Musée Bernard Buffet, Mishima, Shizuoka, Japan
Figuratively Speaking: A Survey of the Human Form, Bellagio Gallery of Fine Art, Las Vegas, NV
The Library of Babel / In and Out of Place, 176 Zabludowicz Collection, London, UK
2009
Walking in My Mind, Hayward Gallery, London, UK
Rites de Passage, Schunck Glaspaleis, Heerlen, Netherlands
6th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art, Queensland Art Gallery, Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane, Australia
STAGES Lance Armstrong Foundation, Galerie Emmanuel Perrotin, Paris, France
15th Anniversary Inaugural Exhibition, Blum & Poe, Los Angeles, CA
2008
Selections from the Hara Museum’s Permanent Collection, Hara Museum of Contemporary Art, Shinagawa, Tokyo, Japan
Order. Desire. Light. An Exhibition of Contemporary Drawings, Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin, Ireland
TOMYAM PLADIB, Jim Thompson Art Center, Bangkok, Thailand
Wonderland: Japanese Contemporary Art, Opera Gallery, Hong Kong
2007
Disorder in the House, Vanhaerents Art Collection, Brussels, Belgium
Bernard Vuffet Museum, Mishima, Shizuoka, Japan
Silly Adult, Galleri Nicolai Wallner, Copenhagen, Denmark
Portrait Session, NADiff, Tokyo; traveled to Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art, Hiroshima, Japan
Red Hot: Asian Art Today from the Chaney Family Collection, Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas
2006
Long Live Sculpture! Middelheim Open-Air Sculpture Museum, Middelheim, Belgium A Magical Art Life, Tokyo Wonder Site Shibuya, Tokyo, Japan
6th Shanghai Biennale, Shanghai Art Museum, Shanghai, China
35 40’ N 139 45’ E Tokyo, Archeus, London, UK
Talking Pictures, Sammlung Goetz, Munich, Germany
2005 | The Elegance of Silence: Contemporary Art from East Asia, Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, Japan
[...] group exhibitions 1984
