roqlarue
 Roq la Rue Gallery
2312 Second Avenue
  Seattle WA 98121
  Phone: 206.374.8977

November 11th - December 3rd
yumiko

"Legend of the Mermaid "

Yumiko Kayukawa
“Beast From The East”
new paintings
and
Moira Hahn
“Sunset Serenade”
new paintings

Opening Friday November 11th 6-10pm
with live music by the Buttersprites
runs through December 3rd

 

moira

"Bento"

yumiko

"Muddy Baby"

Yumiko Kayukawa was born in the small town of Naie in Hokkaido, Japan.(She now resides in Seattle.) The panoramic beauty of her surroundings and feelings of communication with the native animals inspired her to paint the things around her. As a teenager she also fell in love "with the energy and giddiness" of American pop-culture through her exposure to rock n' roll, film, and fashion. By the age of 16, she had debuted into the art world with a comic-book (Manga) feature. Yumiko's work blends fashion illustration, sharp iconic graphics, and meticulously rendered flora and fauna to create images that evoke a dreamy and enigmatically erotic tone. Far from the bold sexuality of Hentai (anime porn) the girls in Yumiko's paintings are mysterious and elusive, using images of both innocence and fetishes in a sexy, subtle way, yet are always engaging the viewer with direct eye contact. For this show Yumiko will be showing paintings on canvas (as opposed to board) for the first time in her career.

Moira Hahn lives in Los Angeles. For this show, a body of work emerged from Hahn’s observation of the natural world, particularly the behavior of birds in her backyard and a host of feral cats that lurk nearby. Hahn’s study of nineteenth century Japanese ukiyo-e masters Kunisada (Toyokuni), Kuniyoshi, and Zeshin inspired her to create scenes in which the birds attempt to level the playing field. In “Revenge of the Tori”, for example, an atelier of vigilant birds print “Wanted” posters of neighborhood cats. Her use of watercolor, a traditionally difficult medium, is flawless and captures the tone of early Ukiyo-e paintings juxtaposed with subtle modern references. In addition, Moira will be showing paintings from a series of work explores that her interest in the long term ubiquity of anime and manga in Japan and the US, and inspired her to replace deities in swirling hypnotic scenes of other dimensions with cartoon icons such as Doraemon and Atom Boy, from Japanese cartoons.

 

moira

"Heaven and Hell"