Ryuji Tanaka is one the most famous Japanese artists who focused on a traditional painting style - nihonga.⁠
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Nihonga is the creative process of mixing mineral pigments and applying them onto the canvas or Japanese washi paper with glue to act as a fixing agent. Usually, Japanese artists apply paint with a brush, however, Tanaka often used a feather which often resulted in wispy contours, as seen in this work.⁠
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His works of the 1960s and 1970s mostly use restricted colours and reflect the artist’s interest in different hues of black. Tanaka added more colour to his works in the following decades; however, he continued to pursue the non-figurative painting style with natural mineral pigments that he developed in the early 1960s for the rest of his life.⁠
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Ryuji Tanaka's work is represented by Axel Vervoordt Gallery.⁠