Hideyo Ohtsuki “Trace & Fix”

11/29(sat) - 12/27(sat), 2025
Opening hours: 12:00-19:00 (Wed-Sat)
Closed on Sun, Mon, Tue and National Holidays
Reception: Saturday, November 29, 18:00-19:00


Shinya Sugawara (Art Criticism / Theory)

The painter Piet Mondrian once produced studies in which he experimented with various compositions by physically applying strips of paper tape directly onto the canvas (New York City I, 1941). In the final work completed on the basis of those studies (New York City, 1942), the paper tape was replaced with colorful painted stripes, and the physical materiality—such as the actual thickness of the tape—disappeared entirely.

In contrast, Hideyo Ohtsuki’s paintings faithfully reproduce the materiality of masking tape through painted imitation: the thickness, the peeling edges, and the texture are recreated as if the tape were truly there. In this respect, Ohtsuki’s direction can be said to be the complete opposite of Mondrian’s.

Paint that has become almost indistinguishable from masking tape does not seem to be painted on the canvas, but rather affixed to it as a physical substance, just like real tape. Moreover, the overlapping of tape strips and their translucent quality are reproduced with precision. At the same time, Ohtsuki’s works—especially when viewed from a distance—can appear to be abstract paintings depicting abstract motifs.
For example, "Retrace", a work exhibited in this show, mimics masking tape materiality in paint like other works by Ohtsuki, while also depicting electrical wires as figurative motifs; yet from afar, it can be appreciated as an abstract composition. The most distinctive feature of Ohtsuki’s paintings lies precisely in this viewing experience, in which abstraction and materiality/figuration repeatedly flip back and forth.

Other forms of such duality are also present. Masking tape, by nature, is a tool used during the process of making a painting. Like Mondrian’s paper tape, it is typically removed and never appears in the completed work. Therefore, it normally exists before or outside the finished piece. By depicting such a process-oriented tool within the painting, Ohtsuki connects and continually inverts elements that are conventionally seen as oppositional: inside and outside of the artwork, process and completion.

Ohtsuki’s works may at times be regarded as feats of hyperrealistic virtuosity, precisely replicating masking tape in paint, and at other times as abstract, formalist paintings. Yet what matters in his work is not either of these interpretations alone, but rather the coexistence of both—materiality/realism and abstraction held simultaneously. This exhibition will undoubtedly offer viewers a rare opportunity to savor such a rich and dynamic viewing experience.


Hideyo Ohtsuki
Born in Miyagi Prefecture in 1975; lives and works in Tokyo.
1998 — Graduated from Tokyo Zokei University, Department of Fine Arts (Fine Arts I).

Selected Recent Exhibitions
Solo Exhibitions: "retrace ~Drawing the Shoreline" (2025, Teisen, Kanagawa), "weather reports" (2019, switch point, Tokyo), “Horizons" (2016, Kodama Gallery, Tokyo)
Group Exhibitions: "The 20th Anniversary - LOOP HOLE Expo. 2025”, (2025, Fuchu Art Museum Civic Gallery, Tokyo), "Still-Work" (2024, LIGHTHOUSE GALLERY, Tokyo), "Sans Filet" (2020, Aoyama | Meguro, Tokyo)