The Machine

Yoshi Nishi (a.k.a YOSHIROTTEN) was born in 1983 in the Japanese seaside city of Kagoshima. From an early age, he was deeply inspired by the spectacular landscape surrounding his hometown, including the several active volcanoes that can be found there. The region being home to much of Japanese mythology as well as the country’s only rocket launch site also contributed to Nishi developing an epic sense of imagination. His love for the light, colour and textures from the natural environment in combination with his passion for mysticism and ‘science fiction’ can now be seen throughout his work, both as a fine artist and art director. Nishi embarked on his career while still a teenager, starting out as a graphic designer where he combined his love for music, fashion and skate culture. In 2015, he founded the creative studio YAR in Tokyo, expanding the scope of his work to include spatial design and video. Since then, Nishi has emerged as one leading professionals in his field as evidenced by his many collaborations with clients including Hermès, McLaren, Nike, Stevie Wonder, Dover Street Market and the Tokyo Gendai Art Fair. Alongside his commercial work, Nishi has been passionately pursuing his fine art production since the beginning of his career. To date, he has been part of nearly 40 exhibitions, not only in Japan, but also in The U.S., UK, Germany and China. In 2018 he held his first major solo show ‘FUTURE NATURE’ at TOLOT gallery in Tokyo, where he presented works on the theme ‘Visualization of Things Invisible’. In 2021 he embarked on his immensely popular ‘SUN’ series which revolves around 365 digital images depicting a silver sun throughout its various phases during the year. Since its inception, it has now been displayed using various mediums and produced on a large scale in a range of environments including at the Japan National Stadium, on Tokyo’s largest digital billboard in Shibuya as well as on the beaches of Kagoshima. In 2024, his retrospective show ‘YOSHIROTTEN Radial Graphics Bio,’ at the Ginza Graphic Gallery, significantly raised his profile throughout Asia and earned him a reputation of mastering a broad range of visual languages. Nishi now lives between Tokyo and London and is deepening his fine art practice further and is looking forward to presenting his work to an even wider international audience.