Japanese artist Chiharu Nishizawa, who was born in 1970 in Nagano, graduated from the Department of Fine Arts (Art and Design), Tokyo Zokei University and majored in painting. Then, Nishizawa changed his major to printmaking when he was in the graduate school. The painting of Chiharu Nishizawa combines his skills of printmaking which he learned from the art school with the ukiyo-e and even introduced the western pop art and the forms of digitalized on-line game virtual spaces into his art works.

In the end of 2008, the special-made piano Nishizawa and Steinway & Sons built together utilizes his art on the cover. That means the piano becomes a unique piece of art. The special-made piano, which is named " The river of the sound”, is designed for the celebration of 10th anniversary of the establishment of Steinway & Sons Japan branch. Chiharu Nishizawa lays a piece of waves representing the blue ocean to interact with his icon-ized mini figures. He uses the water flow as the metaphor of the music flow and shows the elegant rhyme in serenity.

To see the works of Chiharu Nishizawa, we usually see the world of many lives yet with enormous sense of loneliness. Though the white space is left in the screen, and sometimes the white color is replaced with other monochrome, a space without being vacuumed, it is nothing but a virtual world. The people whose faces are blurred are also like symbols of some icons. The cities are like building blocks, the plants are like decorations, the streets are like mazes and the people are like ants who are acting without personalities in it. Everything is icon-ized in the picture. It is like a scene in a video game. Even the picture is indicating some event that is happening right now, lives seem to move on in silence in the huge virtual world of vacuum. Through the paintings of Chiharu Nishizawa, we can realize that when facing lives, human are guided by an invisible force. The regulation must be existing in the universe guiding us. That is the destiny that no one can change no matter how hard we try.

In the extremely flat space, the people in the city wearing the same uniform as if they were chessmen on a chessboard. They are controlled by their fates. The pictures of Chiharu Nishizawa are the life fables he wrote for nature and human, for the East and the West, for the modern and the ancient, for the spirit and the objects, for wars and peace. From normal social phenomenon to private family life, Chiharu Nishizawa has something to say. Therefore, beneath the beautiful colors of his paintings, each piece has a deep fable in it. These propositions are originally philosophical. However, with Chiharu Nishizawa's arrangement, they are turned into mysterious game scenes which make it hard to understand the ideas of the creators with a simple look.

Tell a story in the footsteps with no shadows; a long line of the crowd deduces lifetime episodes. Hope -stacking is proceeding under the painter’s graceful calmness, in emotion-veiled colors, no matter through the plots of pretense, adulation, power and profit scrambling or civilization creating. A story is evolved in the story and a scene is hidden in the scenery, which makes the painting more abundant to read, more complicated to explore. Just like appreciating a drama with great structure that leaves the audience infinitely imaginary space. And this is Nishizawa Chiharu’s peculiar spirit of “disharmonic” to tell a story--- men and women in fair outfits walking far from outside of the painting, with no strong strokes just like being attached on flatly, in subtle changes revealing a tense and dangerous atmosphere. There is a little unease strangeness existing in delicate familiarity, a hope shimmering under a frustrated worry and a cold crisis lurking within the triumphant pride. The audiences seem to fall into various scenes instantly, follow the troops’ footsteps, drive a lovely bombing plane in an airport mansion with a sea of people and then drift off the course together; to feel the slight blues and lost in the supermarket where provides everything; to reappear the civilization as “Along the River During the Qingming Festival” at a joyful celebration; to worship the fashionable art; to look into faraway romance under the mighty threat; to see politicians helplessly in exaggerative and immature masks on a ridiculous political arena; to gloat over misfortune when dressing in armor and climbing to the top glory through treading upon others’ corpses; to indulge in the happy billboard of hero worship, luxury, drugs and material needs; to satirize, desire, introspect; and to pursue a new dream world together.

This May, 2010 in Taipei, the exhibition “Where are you from?” of Nishizawa Chiharu, the people’s connotation concealing behind seems to be richer. In addition to the system of Japanese workers, the artist depicts the variety of the diverse human lives. All walks of life, at first glance, are still well-behaved, yet they have hidden wisdom inside. The painter uses engaged mode to care for the appearance of sur-mundane. The most special one of Taiwanese scenic paintings, which Nishizawa paints for Taipei show, is that among the lovely girls surprisingly hides a tiny Taiwan island but next to the happy rank appears the adults laboring complex construction of purification; about the painting with the building Taipei 101, the numerous crowd actually are barefoot warriors obeying tamely those girls with the boots but there is a little girl aside taking off the boots and run away; perhaps the image of the girls in red skirts is the painter’s imagination about Taipei’s vitality, but on the other hand the stacking life with sand implies the fragile dream as well. A numerous of people look like void and little; however, his paintings conceal some amusing fun or thought-provoking philosophy, humorous and witty, and that is the fascinating charm of Nishizawa Chiharu’s works. Nevertheless, the painter’s whispery connotation strikes strongly the hearts of the appreciators.

When getting in & out with the viewpoints of Chiharu Nishizawa, we can find that the most thing he wants to share with the viewers are all kinds of the fables of lives. What is more, under the skin of elegance, there is an enormous power hidden inside the serenity and analyzing the complex philosophy.

“Dream House”, do ART Gallery, Seoul, Korea
“Enjoy Car Life”, Amelia Johnson Contemporary, Hong Kong

“Local Artists Exhibition”, Kamiyamada Cultural Hall, Nagano, Japan
“Diorama”, Gallery Gen, Tokyo, Japan

“Anotherday”, Gallery Yamaguchi, Tokyo, Japan

2008  “Milestones”, TokyoGallery+BTAP, Beijing, China