Shinpei Kusanagi: It is not far to the sea

Altman Siegel is pleased to present its final exhibition, It is not far to the sea, a presentiation of new paintings by Shinpei Kusanagi.

The older I get,

the closer I get to the end,

the more my body becomes transparent,

the lighter it becomes.

That process. That journey.

The sea is not so far away.

 

There is still a road ahead of me,

and there is a road behind me.

There are still things I must do,

and there are things I no longer need to do.

I will die along the way anyway.

 

April 14, 2020

I was unable to be with my father in his final moments.

I have been thinking about that ever since.

The shape of his toes was just like mine.

What was all that commotion about?

 

I will not forgive you.

I will not forgive myself.

Engrave it on your heart.

I will not board any train.

I will not move from here.

That is the thing.

 

I was waving my hands vigorously.

Someone was supposed to wave back at me vigorously.

But

I just wanted you to see the scene before your eyes.

I just wanted to catch the words that fell from your lips.

But even that has lost its meaning now.

We will never know the truth.

I know very well that the bridge has been burned.

I know it very well!

I wanted to believe in a small fantasy.

 

The sea is not so far away.

A mirage.

An illusion.

A sandy beach.

-ish

painting.

 

–Shinpei Kusanagi, Untitled, 2025

Shinpei Kusanagi’s work has been the subject of solo exhibitions at Altman Siegel, San Francisco, CA; Taka Ishii Gallery, Tokyo, Japan; Tokyo Opera City Art Gallery, Tokyo, Japan; SHOP Taka Ishii Gallery, Hong Kong, China; Opera City Art Gallery, Tokyo, Japan; Gallery Sora, Tokyo, Japan; Bankart Studio, Yokohama, Japan; Makii Masaru Fine Arts, Tokyo, Japan; and Janjanble, Tokyo, Japan. Group exhibitions include Carnegie Art Museum, Oxnard, CA; Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan; Contemporary Art Museum Kumamoto, Kumamoto, Japan; Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art, Hiroshima, Japan; Shane Campbell Gallery, Chicago, IL; Ueno Royal Museum, Tokyo, Japan; and Palace Pocia, Vienna, Austria; among others. The artist’s work can be found in the collections of the LOEWE Foundation; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA; Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan; The Rachofsky Collection, Dallas, TX; and the UBS Art Collection, London, UK.

 

For more information please contact Altman Siegel at info@altmansiegel.com or 415-576-9300.