I am interested in Western artists that are influenced by Asian ideas and Asian artists who are influenced by Western ideas. I’ve seen the works of hundreds, if not thousands of Japanese artists and Kiyoshi Kawaguchi’s works are some of the most striking that I have seen. He synthesizes classical American 30′s and 40′s traditionalism with Japanese modern day technology and craziness of city life in a quite sophisticated way. While artists like Murakami are busy selling out to Anime and money-driven pop culture, Kawaguchi has been true to his technical skills and influences of great paintings tied to great philosophy of present day state of the world. While other artists ignore the world situation and brand their works with Louie Vuitton, Kawaguchi foresees the future and tells it through his cryptic paintings. Indeed, he is a breath of fresh air in an art market that has no soul.
-Walter Wickiser (Walter Wickiser Gallery, Inc.)
Like Piet Mondrian and Stuart Davis, Kawaguchi captures the exuberance and complex rhythms of city life with simple geometry and vibrant color. IN fact, his recent series titled “Jazz” appears a direct nod to these early modernists, who equated the Swing Era tempo with the lively, irregular pulse of a Manhattan street.
Kawaguchi paints bright pictures of a hyperlinked humankind full of possibilities– including being tangled by it’s own connections.
-Deidre S. Greben (former Managing Editor of ARTnews)