Yuta
Nakamura

Kyoto-based Yuta Nakamura studied ceramic art up to doctoral level, and now researches and produces ceramics, tiles and similar from a viewpoint of kogei (applied art) with a folk or architectural focus. Moving with ease between the researcher’s methods of literature review and fieldwork, and the artist’s of modeling with his own hands, Nakamura unpacks the applied-art culture of modern Japan from a unique perspective.

His Atlas of Japanese Ostracon (2012–) is a series of works combining pottery shards collected around Japan with postcards of renowned beauty spots, books and other material. Inspired by the historical fact of Meiji-era zoologist Edward S. Moore’s penchant for collecting ceramics from across Japan, Nakamura in turn uses fragments of pottery he picks up to map the culture and customs of the places where he finds them.

For his first solo exhibition at Gallery Koyanagi, “Willow Festival Little Willow Festival” (2017), he researched the history of the urban space of Ginza, part of the capital that recovered quickly after the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923, and of Gallery Koyanagi predecessor Toho Koyanagi (Koyanagi Ceramics). Portraying the architecture of the temporary shops lining Ginza streets at the time as a chair, Nakamura encased merchandise and archival materials such as books in glass. Ceramic ware, a paper strip with writing on it, and other material left over from Toho Koyanagi were also displayed, on a tiled shelf fashioned by the artist. Meticulous research was thus used to craft a thorough yet unconventional installation.

This concern with the cultural aspects of day-to-day life prompted a gradual shift in Nakamura’s gaze from goods to people. In the “Out of Mingei” project launched in 2018 he teams with designer Yosuke Jikuhara to study the fringes of Mingei, examining the personal networks of this folk craft movement of the Taisho and early Showa era to reveal a series of intertwining associations. An ongoing project within this involves following the footsteps of architect Bruno Taut, who visited Japan in 1933. At the 17th Istanbul Biennial (2022), Nakamura drew a huge correlation diagram on a wall showing the impact of Taut’s craft production across Germany, Japan and Turkey. Through such research Nakamura endeavors to expand the breadth and depth of the kogei domain.

Also in recent years, a burgeoning interest in animal behavior has prompted Nakamura to turn his attention to the realm of living things. At “Japan Rhine Stone, Luehdorfia japonica Line” at the Minokamo City Museum (2018) the artist imagined the world as seen by stones and butterflies as he studied the natural realm and human lifestyles of the Kiso River, arranging works along with archive material from the collection in locations ranging from a gallery set up to resemble a river, to a forest. In 2023’s “Object Lessons” with Ebosi Yuasa, taking inspiration from late Edo-period connoisseurs who would gather to “show-and-tell” and assess unusual objects, Nakamura crafted ceramics that crossed curious modern and contemporary objects with illustrations from biology texts.

Thus while shifting the object of his interest from goods to people to organisms, Nakamura brings elements of all into contact repeatedly to produce art. A practice in which the analytical stance of the scholar and making of the artist coexist moves nimbly back and forth between historical truth and imagination, logic and lyricism, shaping knowledge in new ways.

BIOGRAPHY

1983Born in Tokyo

2011D. Arts, Kyoto Seika University

2016Program of Overseas Study for Upcoming Artists (Short-term: Sydney), Agency for Cultural Affairs, Japan
Lives and works in Kyoto. Associate Professor, Department of Fine Arts, Kyoto Seika University

Selected Exhibitions

2025Sketches: Views from Ishiguro’s Porch in Yase, Kyoto Seika University Gallery Terra-S

2024Ginza Curator’s Room #010 Questioned by the Moon, SHIBUNKAKU, Tokyo
Out of MINGEI / Dig up the Folk, The B-side of MINGEI!, Lifestyle Design Center, Tokyo (Yosuke Jikuhara + Yuta Nakamura)
ONE SINGLE BOOK, Gallery Koyanagi, Tokyo

2023Kanjiro Kawai – What is Kanjiro’s Charm?, Toyota City Folk Craft Museum, Aichi, Japan
Locus of a Butterfly: HASEGAWA saburo’s Illusion, The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto
Object Lessons, Gallery Koyanagi, Tokyo (Ebosi Yuasa + Yuta Nakamura)
Genpei Akasegawa Photos: Particles of Art Scattered in Daily Life, SCAI PIRAMIDE, Tokyo

202217th Istanbul Biennial, Barın Han, Turkey
Eyes on TOHOKU 1930-1945, Iwate Museum of Art, Japan; Fukushima Prefectural Museum of Art, Japan; Tokyo Station Gallery (Yosuke Jikuhara + Yuta Nakamura)
Listening with Eyes and Looking with Ears | NAKAMURA Yuta feels his way to Kawai Kanjiro, The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto
BANBUTSU SHISEI｜Born from all things: A special blend by Yuta Nakamura, Shiseido Gallery, Tokyo

2021New ways to grow: Artists Envision a Post-Covid World, The University Art Museum, Tokyo University of the Arts
Round Persimmon, Dried Persimmon, Takamatsu Art Museum, Kagawa, Japan
Tiles, Small Shrine and Tourism, Season 8, Shimogyo Diver Citizen Center, Kyoto (Ken Tanimoto + Yuta Nakamura)
THE POWER OF ORIGIN, The Japan Folk Crafts Museum, Osaka (Yosuke Jikuhara + Yuta Nakamura)

2020What’s in the Vase?, The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto
Out of Mingei: Akita snow sleigh, Bruno Taut and Tokushi Katsudaira, Akita University of Art Gallery Biyong Point, Japan (Yosuke Jikuhara + Yuta Nakamura)

2019YAMBARU ART FESTIVALl 2019-2020, Ogimi Village Former Shioya Elementary School, Okinawa, Japan (Ken Tanimoto + Yuta Nakamura)
in number, new world / number of the whole world, Ashiya City Museum of Art & History, Hyogo, Japan
The Ecology of Expression: Remaking Our Relations with the World, Arts Maebashi, Gunma, Japan
Tiles, Small Shrine and Tourism, Season 6, Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art, Japan (Ken Tanimoto + Yuta Nakamura)
MAM Research 007: Sodeisha—The Dawn of Contemporary Japanese Ceramics, Mori Art Museum, Tokyo
An Encouragement of Tatsukichi Fujii’s Handicrafts, Nomura Tailor, Kyoto (APP ARTS STUDIO)

2018Ishiguro Munemaro and his Yase Toyo Kiln: New Discoveries after 50 Years, Kyoto Seika University Gallery Fleur
Japan Rhine Stone, Luehdorfia japonica Line, Minokamo City Museum, Gifu, Japan
Tiles, Small Shrine and Tourism, Season 5, Gallery PARC, Kyoto (Ken Tanimoto + Yuta Nakamura)
Aspirations: 8 Doors, Kyoto Seika University Gallery Fleur
Out of Mingei, Seikosha, Kyoto (Yosuke Jikuhara + Yuta Nakamura)
20th DOMANI: The Art of Tomorrow, The National Art Center, Tokyo

2017Willow Festival Little Willow Festival, Gallery Koyanagi, Tokyo
Asia Corridor Contemporary Art Exhibition, Kyoto Art Center (Ken Tanimoto + Yuta Nakamura)
Tile and Botanical Garden: Tourism of Tropical Plants, Higashiyama Botanical Garden, Aichi, Japan

2016Setouchi Triennale 2016, Takamijima, Kagawa, Japan (APP ARTS STUDIO)
Tiles, Small Shrine and Tourism, Season 3, Gallery PARC, Kyoto (Ken Tanimoto + Yuta Nakamura)
Aichi Triennale 2016, Aichi Prefectural Museum of Art, Japan
20th Biennale of Sydney, Carriageworks

2015The 8th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art, Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane, Australia
Tiles, Small Shrine and Tourism, Season 2, Gallery PARC, Kyoto (Ken Tanimoto + Yuta Nakamura)
Unknown City: Inside Out, Kyoto Seika University Gallery Fleur, Kyoto

2014Tiles, Small Shrine and Tourism, Gallery PARC, Kyoto

2013Roppongi Crossing 2013: OUT OF DOUBT, Mori Art Museum, Tokyo

Download Biography Text by Haruko Kohno. Translated by Pamela Miki + Associates.