Rare mixture of themes, questions and skills

When asked, everyone who views Tomohiro Takagi’s paintings would say that the most characteristic aspect of the artist’s works is in his original theme. Strangely behaving human beings wearing animal fur in his recent works is it. The theme itself is a strange one, indeed, but we are struck by their strange behaviors depicted on canvas as well and we are forced to stand in awe in front of his paintings.

The other characteristics of his work are; making his surrealistic world, which sometimes becomes unrealistic in the end by other artists, more vivid by well thought construction and minute and detailed description, which he succeeded heritage of the European modern paintings. Not so many artists could do this.

Then are those characteristic all we see Takagi’s works? More than that.

He poses a philosophical question about existence of the borderline between humans and animals by depicting an eschatological world and expressing his sympathy toward animals as many species have already been extinguished from the surface of the earth.

As humans have committed this crime, his message is “Might our fate be the same one of those animals in the near future too? Are we killing ourselves now?”

Looking back our present world from an eschatological world with humor of bitter sweetness is what we can hear as bottom sound floating in his every works.

So we might say that attractiveness of Takagi’s paintings rests on rare mixture of out-of-blue themes, superb skill and philosophical questions.