Tomokazu Matsuyama Takayama, Prefectura de Gifu, Japón, b. 1976

Tomokazu Matsuyama was born in Takayama, Japan, in 1976. He lives and works in Brooklyn, New York.

Matsuyama received a Bachelor’s degree in Economics from Sophia University (Jochi Daigaku) in Tokyo and a Master’s degree in Communication Design from the Pratt Institute in New York.

In his work, Eastern and Western art and pop culture merge, exploring themes of globalization and national identity in the Internet age. Having grown up between Japan and the United States, the artist fills his large‑scale canvases with references to his bicultural background, drawing inspiration from pop art and manga, cowboys and samurai, graffiti and the Meiji era, abstract expressionism, and woodblock printing. Matsuyama paints his scenes using a vibrant color palette, in compositions that often blur the boundaries between domestic interiors and the natural world.

Among Matsuyama’s most significant exhibitions are those at the Long Museums in Shanghai and Chongqing (China); the Hong Kong Contemporary Art Foundation (HOCA), Hong Kong; the Japan Society, New York; Harvard University, Cambridge, MA; the Katzen Arts Center at the American University Museum, Washington, D.C.; and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney (Australia).

His works are held in the permanent collections of LACMA, Los Angeles; the Asian Art Museum, San Francisco; the Royal Family, Prince of Dubai (UAE); the Sharjah Bank Collection, Dubai; and the Microsoft Collection, among others