Hidetaka Suzuki was born in Hokkaido, Japan in 1986 and completed the Master of Fine Arts, Oil Painting Course at Musashino Art University in 2014. He is currently based in Tokyo.

Selected solo exhibitions include Flourishing In Quietude, Hunsand Space (Hangzhou, 2025); Stereoscope, AISHO (Hong Kong, 2024); Two values, pokettales (Seoul, 2024); Solaris, PTT Space (Taipei, 2024); HIDETAKA SUZUKI SOLO EXHIBITION, ACKERMAN CLARKE (Chicago, 2023); Hallucinations, Edel Assanti (London, 2023); Entity, biscuit gallery (Tokyo, 2022); and Absence of Both, Second 2. (Tokyo, 2021).

Can you tell us about your background and how you started your artistic journey?

I was born in Hokkaido, Japan, and studied painting at Musashino Art University in Tokyo, where I am now based. My career as an artist began when a friend invited me to hold a solo exhibition shortly after completing my graduate studies.

What are the main themes or concepts you explore in your work?

What I explore is the relationship between the body and the image. Something is undeniably at work inside the body, yet it cannot be seen directly. We can only grasp the body through images — fragments of memory, photographs, pictures on a screen. These gradually take on the same reality as lived experience and come to constitute who we are. The motifs I select are drawn from moments in daily life where reality and fiction seem to swap places — a kind of rupture in the ordinary. Using that feeling as my guide, I translate images I have taken myself, images gathered online, and images generated by AI into paintings without distinction. The act of painting is an attempt to provisionally redraw the outline of the self within that uncontrollable flux.

Who or what are your biggest influences, both artistically and personally?

Many artists have influenced me over the years, but if I were to name one thing that feels most present right now, it would be Hayao Miyazaki’s manga Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind. The concepts explored there — peace, justice, truth — still feel like the foundation of my core values.

How do your experiences outside painting, like your work in engineering, influence how you see or structure your images?

I think there are influences from places far removed from the art world — internet memes, amateur snapshots taken without any particular skill. I always want to keep a small element of humor somewhere in each of my paintings.

What do you hope people take away from your art when they experience it?

I hope people feel a sense of curiosity alongside enjoyment — that feeling of encountering something for the very first time and wondering, what on earth is this? I also want them to look for places where the painting connects with their own memories. When that happens, I think the things depicted in the painting can begin to behave as if they were real.

What projects are you currently working on, and what can we expect from you in the future?

I am currently working on an exhibition project with two other artists — something a little different from a conventional group show in terms of how we are involved with one another’s work. It is still taking shape, but if everything comes together, it may be possible to open early next year.

Text and photo courtesy of Hidetaka Suzuki

Website: https://suzukihidetaka.net
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/suzukihidetaka