Our latest collaboration with Tomokazu Matsuyama includes two print editions — Perfect All Alone Ironic comes in two colour ways, one featuring the warm orange hues of the first sun rays at dawn and the other capturing the cool blue of dusk when the sun has just set. Went to visit the artist in his studio to find out more about how his mornings and evenings inspire his creative process.

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AA: What’s a typical New York City morning?

M: Well, a New York City morning is different for everyone, I guess. I like to start my morning very focused and very silent. At nine my guys come, but I get into the studio a little past seven so I have about 90 minutes of my own time. I don’t start with my emails. I start by reading a book, meditating and just thinking. Brain functions are more creative in the morning, so I don’t want to get caught up in errands. I just want that hour and a half of myself being an artist, being a thinker. That thinking will then allow me to become a practitioner.

AA: How would you describe the atmosphere at the beginning of the day?

M: I guess the way I approach my mornings is very ‘Asian’ – I do feel like a Zen monk in a way. My morning starts from the evening. What time do I sleep? What do I eat? How much do I drink? Being in New York, it’s been a hustle and a struggle to become a full-time artist. Thankfully I’ve managed to achieve this for 15 years, but I still get scared that I might lose it. I have to stay focused, so I guess after a certain point in the evening I start to consider the next day.

AA: What do you like to work on in the morning?

M: The biggest struggle or biggest challenge comes down to how much time can you actually invest in thinking. So in the morning, I like to think, I like to write things down. I conceptualise all these fractions of ideas or raw bits and pieces that just kind of jump into my mind. I have about a couple of hundred pages of memos that I write in the morning. And sometimes it just becomes almost trash, but sometimes it becomes a gem and it kind of brightens up my day. It can become a monumental sculpture, a new series of paintings, a new type of installational work or maybe a medium that I’ve never challenged.

AA: If you have a moment alone, where do you like to go? What do you like to do?

M: You know, it’s hard once you start to have such a thing as an artistic career, whatever that means! *laughs* It gets really uneasy to have alone time. I mean, even my studio, it’s a team of 20. And when I go somewhere, it’s normally for what I do – exhibitions or project delivery. Almost any big city you go to has collectors, galleries, curators, friends –. right? So in my alone time, what I like to do is find a spot that doesn’t have a museum, which isn’t actually easy, almost any city has museums. So when I find it, it becomes my destination, but maybe I only get to do it every three years. *laughs*

AA: Where is your favourite place to be at sundown?

M: You know, I like to live with the sun. It’s a kind of analog way of living. Living with the sun really keeps your mind healthy. I’ve lived that way for about 10, 15 years and it’s worked very well. So I’m not a late night guy, you know, I don’t like to do evening emails!

AA: So what’s a typical New York City evening?

M: New York city evenings have everything. I mean, the city’s made of evenings. What I enjoy about it is that if you go a few blocks away, it has a kind of different tone, different mood. The city allows people to have their own kind of community orientation – blended with New York cosmopolitan life. But I’m at the studio from 7am till 10 or 11pm,. so I’m here most of the time, you know! I like to just be in one place. The studio is a platform for me to do everything – I feel very comfortable here.

AA: How would you describe that atmosphere at the end of the day?

M: I like to feel tired at the end of the day. I just want to feel exhausted and just feel comfortable going to bed, you know, in order to kind of rest my brain. When I work harder I feel more excitement when I go to bed.

AA: Do any cultural references come to mind when thinking of the nighttime?

M: When I talk about evenings, all these New York songs come to my mind, like Sinatra or you know, even Jay-Z and Alicia’s empire state of mind. I mean, you go to Yankee stadium and you hear Sinatra’s song everywhere, you go into the city, you hear the Jay-Z and Alicia’s song. That repetitiveness kind of impacts you because it sits in your brain. *laughs* And it’s nothing, you know, in relation to the evening, but the two songs really stayed with me I guess.

AA: So what do you like to do when you have a moment alone in the evening?

M: Well, when I’m in New York I do enjoy listening to jazz. I also like to dine out by myself, which sounds a bit awkward, but having that alone time is actually quite a superb time. *laughs*

To  enter the draw for Matsuyama's upcoming editions here on the Collective, click the link below 👇

🌞🌝 Dawn and dusk with Tomokazu Matsuyama 🌝🌞

Our latest collaboration with Tomokazu Matsuyama — 'Perfect All Alone Ironic' is based on an original work by the artist. The original work is larger than the edition and has Matsuyama's signature free flowing shape. For the edition he has selected a focal point from the original work and turned it into two beautiful circular prints with details in white and metallic gold ink and a layer of high gloss varnish.

For a shot at winning an allocation for these editions, enter the draw here: https://avantarte.co/Matsuyama-tondo-draw

The original inspiration 🎨

Last year @christianluiten wrote about his studio visit with Matsuyama on Discord so we’ll repost here for those who haven’t seen it yet!

Tomokazu Matsuyama is an artist who we’ve worked with for a very long time and one of the first we did multiple collaborations with. Fun fact, before agreeing to collab with us for the first time James Jean actually rang Matsu to get references on us. Without his good recommendation James might have never worked with us.

I went to visit Matsu in 2018 after seeing his work online. I thought his work would be amazing as print editions but he hadn’t done them for a while. His studio was huge, right in the middle of Brooklyn in New York. I knew he was big but not didn’t realise how big. Some artists are scared to show they work with a team, he wasn't like that. He’s actually really proud of all the people that assist him in creating his art and he wanted to make sure his assistants are also in the photo’s that we posted on our Instagram and website. 

He’s a super friendly guy that has an insane focus. Works incredibly hard, is goal oriented and really wants to do things to perfection. He's like an art athlete! His work really shows this mix of different influences. For example that nicki minaj and picasso influenced work you can see in the picture. His art is a hybrid of East and West and has elements of traditional and modern. It really expresses opposites being pulled together, I think it’s what makes his work so captivating.

In one of the photos you can see a Joakim Ojanen sculpture. I did not know Joakim at that time and I asked Matsu who made that sculpture and from that moment he came on our radar. And we now work with him too! Funny how all these artists end up connecting.

Interesting story! His studio is spotless. I also notice Koons. And is that a Scharf above it? 👀 

Thanks for the repost!  Look forward to seeing the AA collab sculpture with him!

🌎STUDIOVISIT: Tomokazu Matsuyama

Tomokazu Matsuyama

Our latest collaboration with Tomokazu Matsuyama, Perfect All Alone Ironic, is based on one of the artist’s original canvases. The twin edition comes in either Orange or Blue both finished with high gloss varnish and an array of silkscreen details in white and metallic gold ink.

Exclusively for Collective members we will hold a draw for 4 of each edition. You can enter the draw both here as well as on our main website to double your chance of winning!

Perfect All Alone Ironic by Tomokazu Matsuyama