Biography

Contemporary artist. CREA / MINAKO ISHIHARA creates works primarily through abstract expression, exploring themes of nature, light, and the cycles of life. She graduated from the Department of Clothing and Textiles, Faculty of Home Economics, and studied oil painting and Japanese painting before establishing acrylic as her primary medium.

For 25 years, she was involved in the management of her family's ready-mixed concrete business, where she encountered, through daily work, the ways in which the blessings of mountains and nature support people's lives and the foundations of society. As a certified Environmental Regeneration Practitioner, she has also deepened her understanding of the relationship between the natural environment and human activity.

Through her research in wellbeing and her work in corporate and municipal training programs, she has developed a deeper awareness of the sensitivity and vitality that human beings inherently possess, as well as what it means to live well. These experiences continue to inform her attitude toward creating art.

Drawing on more than twenty years of tea ceremony practice — with its sense of stillness, negative space, reverence for nature, and Japanese spirituality — she creates works that invite viewers to remember the light within themselves and return to the joy of life.

Artist Statement

At the origin of my artistic practice is the pure joy of painting — a joy I have felt since childhood.

At the end of 2024, I had an opportunity to paint with complete focus, free from thought. Through that experience, I realized once again that painting is a truly essential act for me.

What I encountered in that moment was a feeling of touching the joy of being alive itself.

For me, painting is an act of connecting with my true essence and giving form to what exists within.

The central theme of my work is the joy of life.

By the joy of life, I do not mean only happiness or pleasure. It also includes sadness, uncertainty, and the quiet moments of everyday life — the radiance of simply being alive in this body.

Through my work, I seek to express the quiet strength and beauty that all living beings possess.

What I wish to depict is not a world in which nature and humanity are separate, but a world where all life is connected, circulating, and in harmony — like flowing rivers, forests, light, flowers, animals, and the universe.

When I am in nature, I feel as though I am remembering a sense that human beings once naturally held. Plants and animals do not try to display themselves. They simply live their lives.

By encountering their way of being, I believe that we, too, can live more closely with nature, in love and harmony.

At the root of my painting is a wish for the world to become more peaceful, and for life to revolve around respect, love, and reverence for all living things.

Through my paintings, I hope that viewers will remember the connection with nature that exists within themselves, as well as the joy of life. I hope that this feeling will gradually lead to the way they relate to others, face nature, and make choices in everyday life.

For this reason, I paint with joy, wishing to share the life energy that dwells within my works with many people.

What I aspire to is the realization of a world in which all life exists in harmony, and each being can live with joy. Through art, I hope to contribute to the realization of such a world.