Background
Ishida was born in Yaizu, Shizuoka, Japan, on June 16, 1973. His father was a member of parliament, while his mother was a housewife. Tetsuya Ishida had three elder brothers.
1 Chome-736 Ogawacho, Kodaira, Tokyo 187-0032, Japan
Ishida enrolled in Musashino Art University where he majored in Visual Communication Design in 1992. He graduated in 1996 from Musashino Art University, Tokyo.
1 Chome-736 Ogawacho, Kodaira, Tokyo 187-0032, Japan
Ishida enrolled in Musashino Art University where he majored in Visual Communication Design in 1992. He graduated in 1996 from Musashino Art University, Tokyo.
Tetsuya Ishida surrounded by his artworks.
Tetsuya Ishida working in his studio.
Ishida was born in Yaizu, Shizuoka, Japan, on June 16, 1973. His father was a member of parliament, while his mother was a housewife. Tetsuya Ishida had three elder brothers.
Tetsuya Ishida had a usual childhood and was a perfectly well-disciplined student. Ishida graduated from Yaizu Central High School in 1992. He told in interviews that it was during this period of time that his parents and school principal put pressure on him insisting on his concentration on studies and developing his career as a teacher or chemist. This experience later was mirrored in some of his artworks that explore the society's expectations of youths. Besides, during high school, he became anxious about Japanese society and the current educational system.
Ishida enrolled in Musashino Art University where he majored in Visual Communication Design. His parents, unhappy about his career choice, refused to provide financial support during his studies at the university. The sarin gas attack at a subway station in Tokyo in 1995 had a grave impact on the artist and he even mentions it in his journal later: "One characteristic of Japanese psychology is the idea that all the Japanese people understand each other," meaning that all Japanese are expected to think in the same way which may be the cause of an oppressive system. He graduated from Musashino Art University in 1996.
Ishida and film director Isamu Hirabayashi, his university friend, established a multimedia company collaborating on film/art fusion projects. Due to some economic difficulties during Japan's 1990s recession, their joint venture transformed into a graphic design company. Ishida soon left the company to develop his own career as a solo artist.
In 1906 he held his first solo exhibition "Tadayou Hito" at the Guardian Garden Gallery in Tokyo, Japan. From 1997 to 2005 he won a growing following and positive praise of his artworks, which enabled him to devote himself entirely to his art.
Tetsuya Ishida's paintings feature three major themes: Japan's identity and role in today's world; Japan's social and academic educational structures; and Japanese people's fights to adapt to social and technological changes in Japanese contemporary life.
The artist's works convey anxiety, isolation, crisis of identity, claustrophobia as well as solitude. He portraited school-boys and businessmen as a part of a factory and young people as physically integrated with everyday household objects. Though the motifs in his works resembled Ishida's own face, however, Ishida denied these works were his self-portraits.
In one of his interviews, Ishida stated that regardless of whether he liked painting or not, he had to continue painting "people at mercy of Japan's contradicting nature of its social systems for as long as they exist." In addition, there are some aspects of his artworks that still intrigue a lot of art critics. One of the most discussed topics is a recurring motif found in the majority of Tetsuya Ishida's paintings: a plastic shopping bag. However, the artist had consistently refused to explain its purpose and meaning.
His later exhibitions were the following: "Asia Avante Garde" Exhibition, Christie's, and the 7th Liquitex Biennale, both in 1998; solo exhibition "Ishida Tetsuya", Gallery Q&QS, Ginza, Tokyo, Japan, and Nippon International Contemporary Art Festival, in 1999; group exhibition "Kachu no hitobito" at Tokyo Zokei University in 2001; individual show "Tetsuya Ishida", Gallery Iseyoshi, Ginza, Tokyo, Japan, in 2003.
On May 23, 2005, he was instantly killed by a train at a level crossing in Machida, Tokyo.
Tetsuya Ishida was an extremely talented and exceptional Japanese painter. Since his death in 2005, a lot of unpublished artworks have been uncovered in his home, which brings the estimated total of paintings he produced during his ten-year career as an artist to 186. In 2007, the artist's family donated 21 of his paintings to the Shizuoka Prefectural Museum of Art in their hometown as a permanent exhibition.
Two of Ishida's large pieces went up for auction at the Christie's "Asian Contemporary Art" sale in Hong Kong on November 26, 2006, with the final bid prices surprising many people. The 1998 piece "Collection" had an estimated value of about $13,000 USD and ended up selling for nearly $65,000 USD and the other piece, "Untitled" was estimated at about $10,000 USD and sold for over $100,000 USD.
In 2009, Ishida's family was awarded the purple Japanese Medal of Honour, a decoration for his contribution to academic and artistic developments, improvements and accomplishments.
Earthquake
Untitled
Untitled
Lost
Waiting for a Chance
Collection
Supermarket
Prisoner
Untitled
Untitled
Low-Rise
General Manager's Chair In An Abandoned Building
Cell Phone Robot and Laptop Boy
Can't fly Anymore
The Sleeping Pill Bug
TOYOTA IPSUM
Untitled
Functional
Body Fluids
Winter Fan
Untitled
Work
Criminal Abortion
Wild
Untitled
Decided by myself
A man can't fly anymore
Untitled
