Introduction to Yuzo Yamamoto

Yuzo Yamamoto (b. 1964, Tottori Prefecture) is renowned for his masterful realist painting, which merges classical drawing structures with a contemporary realist vocabulary.

Curator Lo Chan Peng describes Yamamoto’s work: “Eroticism is easy; what’s difficult is capturing desire at the perfect distance.” Beyond the rough physicality of his materials, Yamamoto maintains the restraint and subtlety inherent in Japanese aesthetics—an enduring tension between closeness and distance.

In contrast to the AI logic that idealizes “optimized images” — prioritizing completion, smoothness, and noise elimination — Yamamoto chooses the opposite path: embracing the unfinished, the broken, the residual, and the trace of the hand. Oil, graphite, drips, and scratches interrupt one another, turning the painting into a process, not a pursuit of perfection.

His practice is deeply influenced by the Spanish realist tradition, notably Antonio López-García’s pursuit of the “extreme gaze,” as well as the lineage brought back to Japan by Gustavo Isoe. Within this visual genealogy, Yamamoto not only depicts form, but foregrounds the presence of the hand—where graphite marks, flows, and abrasions are not flaws, but the breathing of materials and the motion of time.

Widely awarded, his works are collected by institutions including the Hasegawa Machiko Art Museum. Amid the sweeping rise of AI, the warmth of the human hand now carries a meaning more vital than ever.