Biography
Kenji Sugiyama

In his artworks, Sugiyama, reconstructing the visual perception as being Russian dolls, restrictS the viewer to a smaller visual field to experience a meta viewing and evoke his memory of the past and his personal experience.

 
 
Kenji Sugiyama was born in 1962 in Nagoya, Aichi Prefecture, where he currently lives and works. 
 

"Institute of Intimate Museums"

Since 1998 Kengi Sugiyama has been developing his ongoing series "Institute of Intimate Museums" (I.I.M), where he creates imaginary museums and libraries. 
The "I.I.M" series began while Sugiyama was living in Canada, with the creation of "Commercial Package (Spaghetti Box)" — an imaginary museum built within a box. Since then, Sugiyama has expanded this concept across various mediums, using mirrors and other visual illusions to create three-dimensional museums and libraries.
 
The "I.I.M" series explores the concept of the artist’s private museum becoming an intimate experience for the viewer. Through Sugiyama’s works, viewers peer into frames that reveal a museum showcasing his past works, alongside personal items, and a library representing his mind, filled with books made from exhibition materials.
This layered structure creates a sense of infinite repetition, where viewers are not only observing the artwork but also witnessing other viewers within an exhibition, much like the nested layers of a Russian Matryoshka doll, evoking a surreal and endless experience.
 

These museums and libraries are intimate, private spaces where only one person can engage at a time. The artwork comes to life when the viewer interacts with each piece, drawing on memories from past visits to similar places and reinterpreting those memories within the work.

The viewer’s personal experiences, including memories and physical traits like eyesight, influence how they perceive the art, creating a unique and reimagined mental exhibition. In this way, Sugiyama’s work links the memories and imaginations of both the artist and the viewer, making the viewer feel like a vital part of the artwork.

 

The works Inside and Outside, enact circular paths, from being object of observation lead to observing and again to be the subject of an observation more intimate and personal, within the work of art itself. Through these circular paths, the visitor is asked to recreate his own Museums, remembering what has been previously visited, what has been lived and experienced, reconstructing the memory.
As Proust stated, time, interior or exterior, is always tied to the past, but, at the same time, is a time which tends to the present. The proustian epiphany, the memory solicited by a casual feeling that evokes the past with no locical proceedings and lets feel as contemporary that past, is what Sugiyama proposes in his works, bringing the viewer’s to awake the consciousness, for a new awareness of the act of seeing, of feeling and remember, to understand that this new experience is totally and inescapably personal and unique.

 

The act of peering into these works forms intimate connections between viewer and artist, reflecting how societal connections are sustained through shared memories. Sugiyama’s unique spaces, which document his personal past, awaken universal emotions and collective memory. 

Exhibitions
Works
Solo & Group Show
Kenji Sugiyama

Kenji Sugiyama CV

Born in 1962 in Nagoya (Japan).

 
EXHIBITIONS

Solo show

2024

Gaze into the distance, Primo Marella Gallery, Lugano, Switzerland (Upcoming)

Gaze into the distance, STANDINGPINE, Tokyo, Japan

2022
I.I.M – Inside the Head, La Lanta Fine Art, Bangkok, TH

2021
I.I.M – Institute of Intimate Museums, CADAN Yurakucho, Tokyo, JP Sushi - A World in a Grain of Sand, Tokyo Gallery, Tokyo, JP

2020
Kenji Sugiyama, Primae Noctis Gallery, Lugano, CH

2018
Cell – Closed Chamber as Myself, Inside and Outside – STANDING PINE, Nagoya

2015
Institute of Intimate Museums, La lanta Fine Art / Bangkok, Thailand

2014
Institute of Intimate Museums Mirror Mirror, Primae Noctis Art Gallery, Switzerland Institute of Intimate Museums Ghosts in my mind, STANDING PINE, Nagoya

2010
I.I.M. The world’s End, STANDING PINE, Nagoya

2009
Institute of Intimate Museums 1999-2008, STANDING PINE, Nagoya

2007
Self-Portrait, Gallery Ray, Nagoya

2006
Very Inner Place, Gallery Ray, Nagoya

2005
Viewer, Gallery Ray, Nagoya

2003
I.I.M. Director"A", I I M Director"B", Nagoya City Archives, Nagoya

2001
I.I.M. Director's Room Gallery OH”, ORIBETEI, Aichci

2000
I.I.M. Institute of Intimate Museums”, A.C.S, Nagoya

1999
“Institute of Intimate Museums”, A.C.S Nagoya

1997
Inside Outside, A.C.S, Nagoya

1996
Inside Outside, A.C.S, Nagoya

1995
Inside Outside Focusing on a New Generation in ‘95, Gallery Yamaguchi, Tokyo Inside Outside Face to Face, A.C.S, Nagoya

 

Group Show

2023

Labyrinth of Perspectives  Institute of Intimate Museums of humans and dogs, East Osaka Art Museum, Osaka, Japan
2022

Kisogawa Expedition – Searching for the Mysterious,  Minokamo / Gifu, Japan

2021

What Our Dogs Say, STANDING PINE / Nagoya, Japan

Sushi: A World in a Grain of Sand, Tokyo Gallery + BTAP / Tokyo

2019

The Depths and Shallows of Emotion,Yamazaki Mazak Museum of Art / Nagoya, Japan

2018
Treasure Box of Contemporary Art, OPAM Toshioka Collection Oita Prefectural Art Museum Oita Through the Looking Glass, COB Gallery, London, UK

2017
DESTINATION : ASIA NOW, Primae Noctis Gallery, Switzerland

2016
CROWD, A Perfect day for Kiso River ”, Minokamo, Gifu, Japan

2013
Wavy banners ET4U, DK

2012
Who is inside ?, Contemporary Art in Toyohashi Aichi Art Program, JP

2011
Who is inside ?, Kiyosu City Haruhi Art Museum Aichi, JP

2007
City-net Asia Seoul Museum of Art Korea, KR

2006
Next station, Nagoya citizen gallery Yada Nagoya, JP

2005
Peindre, Symposium international d’art contemporain de Butins, musees et autres curiosites, galerie HORACE, CA

Baie-Saint-paul, CA

Art, USA

Aichi, JP

2004
Institute of Intimate Museums, IBCube Gallery Bovelingjerg DK

2003
JAPAN:RISING, Palm Beach Institute of Contemporary Art Position Nagoya City Art Museum Nagoya, JP

2002
THE FIRST MOVE, Tokyo International Forum Exhibition Hall Tokyo, JP

Contemporary

2001
HAKOIRI-BIJYUTU, (Art in Box) Kariya City Art Museum 24 Winners from 1996 to 2000 FUJI TV Forum, Tokyo, UMEDA STELLA Hall Osaka, JP

1999
First Steps, Grey Art Gallery, N.Y.U. USA

1998
Philip Morris Art Award 1998 Tokyo International Forum Exhibition Hall Tokyo, JP Memento, EST-NORD-EST Centre de Sculpture, Quebec, CA

1997
EFFET D'UILITAIRE, le Centre d'exposition de Baie-Saint-Paul, CA

1996
Inside of Works, Outside of Works, Itabashi Art Museum Tokyo, JP

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