Daisuke Abe

Daisuke Abe (born 1977, Kyoto) is a Japanese printmaker and Associate Professor at Joshibi University of Art and Design (Department of Oil Painting, Printmaking Course), where he has held the appointment since 2017. He is one of two artists working as printmakers in contemporary Japan with the romanized name Daisuke Abe and is distinguished by the kanji 阿部 大介 (the other Daisuke Abe is 阿部 大輔, also a printmaker, primarily based in Aichi). Abe trained at Kyoto Seika University in printmaking, graduating in 2002, and completed his graduate studies at Aichi Prefectural University of Fine Arts and Design in 2004 — placing his Joshibi appointment at the end of a Kyoto-Aichi-Tokyo career trajectory through three of the principal Japanese print-teaching institutions.

Abe's central practice is what he describes as "peeling away surfaces from everyday objects" — household items, floors, walls, tools — and re-presenting these surface fragments as printed thin membranes. The technique involves using objects like wrenches, hammers, motorcycle parts, and worn industrial tools as the printing matrix itself, then using copper-plate process or relief printing to capture the surface in ink on Japanese paper. His best-known solo exhibitions — Untitled • CB125T (AIN SOPH DISPATCH Nagoya, 2015), Figure (AIN SOPH DISPATCH, 2019), and Yohaku no Himaku ("Membrane of Margin," AIN SOPH DISPATCH, 2023) — extend the same technique across an iconography of forgotten or discarded technical objects. His ART OSAKA 2025 Expanded Section presentation Untitled・Tools (2023) used variable-size acrylic-medium-on-tool installation to bring the practice into a fully sculptural register.

The central conceptual register of his work is what he terms the "trace of human use" — he has said that his prints visualize the marks of time and actions engraved on objects which would otherwise be invisible. Worn tools carry these marks; printing them gives the marks legibility. The 32nd Nagoya Art Creation Award (2016) recognized this as a distinctive contribution to the regional Aichi print scene.

Before the Joshibi tenure-track appointment Abe held non-tenured teaching positions at Tokyo University of the Arts (Tokyo Geidai), Nagoya University of Art and Design, and his alma mater Kyoto Seika University. The cumulative teaching record places him as one of the rare contemporary Japanese printmakers to have circulated through every major print-teaching institution in the country. At Joshibi he is part of the Printmaking Course (版画コース) within the Oil Painting specialization, and his research focus is the Print Studies field at the graduate level.

His work is held in the University Art Museum of Aichi Prefectural University of Fine Arts and Design, the Machida City Museum of Graphic Arts (Tokyo's principal print museum), and the Silpakorn University collection in Bangkok, Thailand. He shows regularly with AIN SOPH DISPATCH (Nagoya), the gallery directed by Amano Chieko that has been one of the principal Aichi-region commercial venues for contemporary Japanese printmakers.