Ulala Imai

Hola Strangers

18/09 - 20/11

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Lulu by X Museum se complace en presentar una exposición individual de la artista japonesa radicada en Tokio, Ulala Imai.

 

Las pinturas de Ulala Imai son engañosamente simples. Inmediatamente agradables e íntimas, se ocupan de temas cotidianos, que van desde bodegones de comida, a retratos de figuras de la cultura popular (Star Wars, Peanuts, etc) hasta paisajes con peluches incluidos en ellos. Siguiendo su admiración por la pintura occidental, en particular la de Edouard Manet, su trabajo de pincel sumamente sensual, resulta rápido, seguro de sí mismo y deliciosamente abreviado, como si Imai hubiera dominado la representación de todo lo que desea retratar con perfecta modestia y economía. Quizás más importante que esto es su propensión y capacidad para transmitir luz, impregnando hábilmente todo en sus lienzos con una luminosidad asombrosa, una luminosidad que se emana y se proyecta sobre lo que pinta. Esto tiende a imbuir su trabajo de una ligereza brillante y vigorizante. Sin embargo, lo que describe está marcado por una palpable melancolía. Como cualquier buen bodegón de comida, contiene el pathos del memento mori. Este pathos se ve acentuado por el hecho de que Umai nació con una discapacidad auditiva severa, un hecho que, una vez conocido, puede ayudar a explicar la cualidad cuasi-hermética que persigue sutilmente sus cuadros (un hermetismo anidado en la paradoja de la inmediatez de su pintura). Como tal, el rango emocional de su trabajo, que va desde lo alegre hasta lo elegíaco, es rico y amplio. Por mucho que ennoblezca sin pretensiones cosas como un sándwich de baguette, un tazón de aguacates o, digamos, Chewbacca, sigue siendo profunda y satisfactoriamente humilde en su compromiso con lo humano y lo cotidiano.

 

Ulala Imai (n. Kanagawa, Japón, en 1982) vive y trabaja en Tokio. Una selección de exposiciones individuales recientes incluye (2021) MELODY, Parco Museum, Tokyo AMAZING, Nonaka-Hill, Los Ángeles (2020) Gathering, Union Pacific, London Nidi gallery, Shibuya, Tokio; Kyoto RC Hotel Yasaka, Tokio; OIL de Bijututecho, Shibuya; project N Tokyo opera city art gallery, Hatudai, Tokyo (2019) boyAttic, Daikanyama, Tokyo; XYZ gallery, Sugamo, Tokio. Las exhibiciones colectivas recientes incluyen (2021) SHINING IN THE LOW TIDE, Uncle Brother, New York; Nature Morte, The Hole, New York (2020) The Sentimental Organization of the World, galerie crevecoeur, Paris; Echoes of Monologues, ANOMALY, Tokyo.


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Lulu by X Museum is pleased to present a solo exhibition of the Japanse, Tokyo-based artist Ulala Imai.

 

The paintings of Ulala Imai are deceptively simple. Immediately likable and personable, they deal with very quotidian themes, ranging from still lives of food to portraits of figures from from popular culture (Star Wars, Peanuts, etc) to landscapes with stuffed animals in them. In keeping with her admiration of western painting, in particular that of Edouard Manet, her sensuous brush work comes off as a rapid, self-assured, and delightfully abbreviated, as if Imai has mastered depicting whatever she wishes to portray with perfect understatement and economy. Perhaps more important than this is her proclivity and ability to convey light, deftly suffusing everything in her canvases with an uncanny luminosity, which both emanates from and is projected upon what she paints. This tends to imbue her work with a bright and invigorating levity. Nevertheless, what she depicts is marked by a palpable melancholy. Like any good still life of food, it contains the pathos of the memento mori. This pathos is heightened by the fact that Umai was born with a severe hearing impairment, a fact which, once known, may help to account for the quasi-hermetic quality that subtly haunts her pictures (a hermeticism nested in the paradox of her painting’s immediacy). As such, the emotional range of her work, which runs from the joyous to the elegiac, is rich and broad. As much as it unpretentiously ennobles things like a baguette sandwich, a bowl of avocados, or, say, Chewbacca, it remains deeply and satisfyingly humble in its commitment to the human and everyday.   

 

Ulala Imai (b. in Kanagawa, Japan, in 1982) lives and works in Tokyo. A selection of recent solo exhibitions includes (2021) MELODY, Parco Museum, Tokyo AMAZING, Nonaka-Hill, Los Angeles (2020) Gathering, Union Pacific, London Nidi gallery, Shibuya, Tokyo; Kyoto RC Hotel Yasaka, Tokyo; OIL by Bijututecho, Shibuya; project N Tokyo opera city art gallery, Hatudai, Tokyo (2019) boyAttic, Daikanyama, Tokyo; XYZ gallery, Sugamo, Tokyo. Recent group exhibitions include (2021) SHINING IN THE LOW TIDE, Uncle Brother, New York; Nature Morte, The Hole, New York (2020) The Sentimental Organization of the World, galerie crevecoeur, Paris; Echoes of Monologues, ANOMALY, Tokyo