Eguchi Ayane continues to create art themed around the harmony of loveliness and eeriness, life and death—linguistically contradictory elements—that exist in this world. Her paintings, rendered in highly saturated colors, depict fantastical landscapes with adorable creatures like teddy bears and colorful mushrooms. However, the details reveal their flesh and blood, reminding us that the world she depicts is exactly the same as the contradictory one in which we live. The surface of the paint on the canvas, its textures and dynamism, and the glossy, luminous coating will vividly captivate viewers’ eyes.
Springtime Haniwa Horse
2025
Oil on canvas
24.2 x 33.3 cm
Cat’s Futon
2025
Oil on canvas
42.2 x 42.3 cm
Lapis Lazuli Tiger’s Tail
2025
Oil on canvas
24.2 x 33.3 cm
Sakura futon
2026
Oil on canvas
24.4 x 33.5 cm
Eguchi Ayane
Born in Hokkaido in 1985. Completed a Master’s degree in oil painting at the Graduate School of Fine Arts and Crafts, Kanazawa College in 2011. In the same year she received the Special Jury Award in the graduation project category of the KANABI Creative Award 2010. Since then, Eguchi has held group and solo exhibitions to great popular acclaim, both inside and outside Japan. At first glance, her work seemingly depicts cute characters in a fantasy world, but upon closer inspection reveals a flesh-and-blood eeriness and an undercurrent of violence to present both contradiction and harmony on the canvas. Eguchi’s major solo exhibitions include Sugar-Coated Landscape (2023, Hiro Hiro Art Space, Taiwan) and Cosmos of color (2025, Mizuma Art Gallery, Tokyo). She also participated in ART OF MIKU (Parco Museum Tokyo), a contemporary art event held in 2024.
Many upon hearing the title Spring Sleep will immediately recall the words “unaware of the dawn.” I believe the reason a line from an ancient Chinese poem resonates so intensely is because it speaks on a deeper level with so many people. When we wake from sleep, our natural assumption is that that we continue to be the person we were before we fell asleep. However, sometimes, after particularly interesting or frightening dreams, I wonder if the person I was before drifting off to sleep and the person I am upon waking are truly the same.
Perhaps sleep is akin to a small death, and with each sleep, in some way, we are reborn anew.
These paintings celebrate the comfort, the strangeness, and the irresistibility of sleep, combined with the gentle beauty of spring.
Eguchi Ayane