The Great East Japan Earthquake of 2011 had a profound impact on his productionĭeeply affected by the earthquake and tsunami, Nara found himself temporarily unable to work. In sculpture as in painting, Nara again harmonised modern and centuries-old craft. These works, which retain impressions from the artist’s hands, are often coated in liquid metal that cracks like the glaze on Song dynasty Chinese ceramics. Nara also began experimenting with other mediums, sculpting heads of figures from his paintings. He settled in Cologne in 1994, a pivotal time for the artist as he began to incorporate Japanese and Western popular culture into his work.

At the prestigious Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, where he studied from 1988 to 1993, Nara became fascinated with Neo-Expressionism and punk rock both of these movements would shape his artistic style, although he denies punk was his only musical influence. Nara moved to Tokyo in his teens, and then to Nagakute when he was 21 to study art at the Aichi University of the Arts, before leaving Japan for Germany. ‘I could communicate better with animals, without words, than verbally with humans.’ ‘I was lonely, and music and animals were a comfort,’ he admitted. The youngest of three boys of working parents, he spent much of his free time lost in Japanese comic books. Yoshitomo Nara was born in 1959 in Hirosaki, a city known for its traditional Edo Period (1603-1868) architecture and cherry blossom trees, in Japan’s mountainous northern Aomori Prefecture.

Nara was transformed by his time in Germany

Yoshitomo Nara by Kristin Chambers