Enna Konoma
E
Curation and Words by Alison Groves
2019/20
Enna Konoma was born in Tochio, Niigata in 1985 where she lives and works. She studied Design and Animation at Tokyo Zokei University, and studied at University of West England, Bristol on an exchange program. In 2019 she was commissioned to create a book cover illustration for Matsumoto Junpei’s popular novel惑星たち(‘wakuseitachi’; ‘The Planets’). Working across watercolour, acrylic, ink and mixed media, she has held solo exhibitions in Tokyo and Niigata, and produces designs for fashion, textiles and home wares, as well as graphic designs and illustrations for books, magazines and digital contexts. Her next solo exhibition will be held in June 2020 at Alla gallery in Tokyo.
Enna’s saturated abstractions offer a strong narrative presence. Between wistful descriptions of dreamscapes or fractured maps, there’s a grounded connection to landscape. But, rather than charting topography with precision, Enna communicates lyrical connections and experiences. She unearths fragments of meaning found in chance encounters, fascination with the scenery, conversations and memories; filters these experiences through a stream of consciousness process to finally plot these minutiae in vivid colour. Her imaginative place-making process is part-fiction part-truth, and an open invitation for exploration.
This collection of works reflects the spectrum of the artist’s painting practice, from still life interior studies, to hyper-patterned semi-fictional cityscapes, and experimental abstractions.
For me, landscape means Life, People, Connection, Relation. From a distance, my paintings are abstract. Only when one approaches to look closely can you notice what is actually painted. I attempt this kind of illusion to question ‘authentic meaning’ in things. Landscape is a good motif to play with in terms of breaking the original representation and reconstructing it to my own vision.
As a Niigata local, Enna’s artist residency is akin to being a ‘tourist in your own backyard.’ But, with Niigata being a vast and mountainous prefecture, the artist’s visit to AIR Myoko in summer 2019 was her first experience of Myoko-kogen. Struck by the ‘sweetness and sounds’ of the summer air, she described Myoko-kogen ‘like finding an exotic sweet in my local supermarket.’
For people in Niigata, I think the image of高原 ‘kogen’ (tableland or plateau) is almost heavenly: the colour of ‘kogen’ seems like ever lasting green, with a very calm breeze. I still have a huge imagination and think there may be some mythical creatures out there.
The hyper-detailed scenic works share a trace of the artist’s early wanderlust. Like many Japanese children, Enna was raised on Studio Ghibli animation. Rather being captivated by characters or narratives, she was fascinated by the architecture of the fantasy worlds. When she grasped the animations’ references were European, her mind was set to see it for herself. As an art student, Enna went on exchange to the UK with this hidden agenda, visited countless small neighbourhoods, looking for the semi-fictionalised Europe in her mind. She commenced this series of cityscapes upon returning to her studio, and has continued to develop it for over a decade.
Her second landscape series offers a more abstracted dialogue with place and meaning: developed in a process she describes as laden with gūzen (chance). These works are seeded through her practice of grounding in new surrounds through drawing or reading. As a tourist, she seeks out places with unusual natural beauty or old customs. Taking it in, solitarily, she sits for hours buried in a book or occupied with mark making. She describes this slow paced activity as offering a slip into a possible ‘daily life’ in this new environment. Finally, returning to her studio pace, Enna says:
‘I ferment these experiences…and then allow my unconsciousness to flow out. I don’t intend to express concrete ideas. My internal dialogue just has an external conversation with the paper.’
