AI KOWADA GALLERY is pleased to present "i(Ai)", an exhibition of an
art work by a Naoki Award winning writer Kanako Nishi.

This show is the first one to present Nishi's artistic output in the
field of visual art, about which the novelist is as passionate as she
is about her writing. Nishi has often drawn pictures for the front
cover design of her books and the images have all contributed well to
invite her readers to be immersed in the fictional world of her
creation. She has also recently provided a front cover illustration
for Kirara, the magazine at its request.

The exhibit is a brand new mural installation covering the whole
gallery walls, by which the artist intended to establish the visual
equivalent of the final scene of her recent novel titled "i (Ai)".
Nishi, who has never received a formal art education, boldly draws
with pastel crayons on used cardboard picked up at local supermarkets.
The color layers she creates with the medium give bright and strong
impression as if they are the outbursts of energy from the creator's
body and the spirit. One may relate her way of working with that of
graffiti artists who freely expresses themselves with color spray cans
in their hands.

It has been observed that there is at the core of all Nishi's creative
output a sense of a quest for a true self. As most explicit in "Good
Bye!", her writings have always encouraged people in identity crisis
who had lost their way to be just the way they are. This attitude of
the writer is continuing in "i (Ai)", in which the main character
named Ai, a Syrian girl adopted by a couple of an American and a
Japanese struggles to gain her identity and spiritual liberty through
the years in which the world faced the tragic events of: the 9.11, the
Syrian Civil War and the Great East Japan Earthquake.

The mural installation wrapping the whole gallery space in full
360°may well be recognized as fully revealing the writer/artist's true
self. The experience of being immersed in this rich visual field
promises pure bliss for both the fans of her books and those who have
yet to experience her literary world.

--
Kanako NISHI

Received the aforementioned award"Naoki Award" with "Good Bye!" in
2015 had launched her career as a writer with "Aoi"(2004), after which
she steadily increased the reputation as a writer through works such
as "Tsutenkaku" and "Fukuwarai." which won the 2007 Oda Sakunosuke
Prize and the 2013 Hayao Kawai Award in Literature respectively. "The
Yellow Elephant" which was made into a film starring Aoi Miyazaki and
Osamu Mukai has helped to increase her readers.