Kosuke Ajiro

Kosuke Ajiro (b. 1980) is a Tokyo-based artist. He continues his pursuit from childhood to capture the “other world” within himself. His practice centers on acrylic painting, and also includes ceramics, sculpture, animation, music, and more.

This “other world” is based on the artist’s childhood memories, influences, and familiar events, but is presented as the narrative of “an unknown civilization that died out in the medieval period of its development.” It is fiction, but at the same time, it is the artist’s internal reality. As an archaeologist excavating this lost civilization, Ajiro paints and records the history of the distant past as it unfolds before his eyes one after another. The works are ancient relics, which is why they show signs of aging, as if they have decayed. Each work has its own historical setting and context, the characters and imaginary monsters are sometimes given proper names, and the scenes depicted have meaning. The scenes can be labeled as origin myths, lessons, fables, or minor events. These detailed settings develop into the grandiose backdrops of dynasties, creation myths, and civilizations, the full scope of which is still unknown, even to the artist himself. In the “other world,” freed from constraints, we find a variety of absurdities. It is no wonder that cruelty and humor, grotesqueness and cuteness coexist. The artist often has doppelgangers in which he witnesses himself in the form of a “girl” and records them in pictures.

In Ajiro’s works, we can see elements of traditional Japanese picture scrolls, European medieval manuscripts, and various folk religious art from the East and West, especially the influence of Hieronymus Bosch. In terms of the expression of a deeper consciousness, the works can be related to Jung, surrealist visionary art, and outsider art, and also have a close affinity with contemporary Japanese character culture.